


Morganthe's Apprentice

by Rebecca Ripple (RebeccaRipple)



Series: Song of the Spiral [1]
Category: Wizard101
Genre: Angst, Destiny, Emotional Trauma, F/M, Fantasy, Hurt/Comfort, Magic, Non-Graphic Violence, Romance, Series, Wizards
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-15
Updated: 2016-02-15
Packaged: 2018-05-20 19:11:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 24,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6021583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RebeccaRipple/pseuds/Rebecca%20Ripple
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In a dangerous attempt to destroy the Shadow Web from the inside, a fifteen-year-old Theurgist named Rebecca Dreamhunter plans to convince Morganthe that she has left Ravenwood to join her cause. In the process, the challenges she faces will test her determination, her courage, and her will to survive. Note: Alternate (AU) version of Khrysalis.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Into the Shadows

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on Feb. 9, 2014.

Rebecca Dreamhunter shivered as she walked, clutching desperately at the sleeves of her jade-colored robes, her only shelter against the bitter wind. She bit her lip to keep her teeth from chattering, cursing the mission that brought her to this evil-infested place. She wondered whether success in that mission would one day return warmth to the land.

Though the icy gusts of wind did their best to drive her back, and though her limbs felt heavier with each step she took, she pressed onward, determined to reach Morganthe’s palace before the sky went black and shadows covered everything in sight. She didn’t want to spend another night hiding in some cave, too wary of every little noise to sleep.

True to her plan, she had left all of her belongings in Ravenwood, save for a canteen of water and the clothes she wore. Her mouth and throat were as dry as Krokotopian sand, and her stomach ached constantly. Thinking back, she noted that it had been about three days since she’d emptied and discarded her canteen, and several more since she had enjoyed a decent meal. The grass and berries she’d harvested back in the Last Wood weren’t exactly the ingredients of anything resembling fine dining… and yet, they had been better than nothing.

With that said, she had yet to regret leaving Wizard City. As desperate and tired as she was, and as much as she missed the comforts of her Ravenwood home, she had to admit that devising her own plan, for once, was enough of a thrill to keep her focused. For the first time since her enrollment at the Ravenwood School for the Magical Arts, she knew exactly what she needed to do, and why. No one else was planning her next move; no one else even knew what she was up to. She was in charge, and that felt pretty awesome.

Her present discomfort was nothing, so she told herself, compared to the endless suffering Morganthe would cause throughout the Spiral, should she succeed in learning the Song of Creation. It was imperative that Rebecca be the one to stop her; no one else had any real ideas for how to do so, and failure was not an option. Indeed, it never had been.

Her plan seemed simple enough on the surface: she would gain Morganthe’s trust and become her apprentice, learning every spell she could from the Shadow Queen, and use it against her at the first opportunity. The arrogant witch would not live to know what hit her! How Ravenwood would rejoice to know that they and their neighbors across the Spiral would be safe from another vicious, universal threat - first Malistaire, then the Coven, and finally, Morganthe the Arachnophiliac!

The beginnings of a grin formed on Rebecca’s pale face as she thought of the comical title, and she snickered to herself, forgetting for an instant to be careful. Remembering herself at once, she looked up just long enough to see what was ahead of her. Immediately, she stopped short. Looming in the distance, she could just make out the silhouettes of several tall, shadowy towers, their windows sparkling like ominous, glowing eyes watching her.

She’d made it to the Shadow Palace!

Somehow, it made Rebecca feel even colder to know that she was so near to her most hated enemy, who hated her even more. She shuddered, but knew there was no turning back now. She had come too far to leave the fate of every world to chance. Calling on every ounce of courage she possessed, she started toward the palace once again.

As could be expected, a couple of mantis guards stopped her the moment she stumbled into view. “What do you want here, spellbinder?” one of them demanded while the other knocked her to the ground with one simple blow to the abdomen.

Groaning weakly, Rebecca collapsed to her knees and clutched her stomach, though the actual pain the guard’s staff had caused was next to nothing. “P-please…” she winced, raising her shaking free hand in a peaceful gesture, “I don’t want a fight.”

The mantis who had attacked her reached out suddenly and grabbed her hair, pulling her back up to a standing position. “No?” he sneered mockingly. Then, turning slightly to address his fellow guard, he asked in much the same tone, “What do you think, Vez? What should we do with it? _Tssk…_ I don’t think this one’s worth a dungeon cell.”

Vez seemed to think over his options for a few seconds, after which, he narrowed his eyes, staring down at Rebecca. “You’re the strange one, aren’t you?” he pointed out thoughtfully. “Whenever we see one of _your_ kind here, a fight’s usually the first thing they ask for.”

When Rebecca didn’t answer – for she had been unaware that an answer had been required of her – the other guard tightened his grip on her thick, brown hair, pulling it harder. “ _Ungh!_ ” she cried. “I-I’ve left my kind… Please let go of me… _Ahh!_ I swear I won’t try to run off.”

Vez suddenly interrupted her pleading. “Krazz, listen up. Now that I think about it, didn’t Her Majesty tell us to bring any spellbinder we catch straight to her?” Rebecca’s heart jumped at the suggestion. This part of the plan might turn out easier than she had thought. Still, she had to keep pretending…

“Of course! I knew that…” Krazz answered. For some reason, Rebecca sensed a hint of disappointment in his voice.

“Cheer up, Krazz,” said Vez. “ _Tssk…_ I’m sure she’ll let us watch.”

Krazz followed without another word, practically carrying Rebecca along by her hair and ignoring her subsequent pleas.

* * *

A while later, they reached a large, stone door beyond a wide set of marble stairs, leading into the tallest of the towers. The door opened outward with a faint creak, and warm air brushed softly against Rebecca’s face and arms. She would have found the sensation soothing if her head hadn’t been hurting so badly from the hair-pulling.

As the three of them entered, Rebecca looked around as best she could with her head essentially immobilized. They had walked into a sort of hallway, in which the walls were decorated with various, gold-framed portraits of Morganthe, hung over brown-on-black, spider-themed wallpaper. It was, at best, a nauseating sight for a Theurgist, but she carefully contained her disgust, forcing her face into an awed expression instead.

Finally, they reached what appeared to be a sort of throne room. It bore an aura even darker and more foreboding than the other rooms she had seen into.

“Ahh, the young wizard!”

Rebecca knew that lofty voice all too well. No sooner had she heard it, however, than Krazz finally released his grip on her hair, pushing her forward a little so that she fell face-down upon the floor. “ _Mff!_ ” she grunted as her chin made contact with the black stone.

Morganthe laughed heartily at Rebecca’s pain. Rebecca stayed put on the floor, but she could hear the Umbra Queen rise from her throne to approach her. She made no attempt to protect herself as the crisp footsteps came closer, and without a word of warning, a stabbing pain surged through her arm like lightning through an old tree, and it took her a moment to realize what had hurt her this time: Morganthe had slammed the sharp heel of her boot into the back of her captive’s right hand.

The young wizard screamed herself dizzy, the plan forgotten for the moment, until at last, Morganthe stopped crushing her wand-hand. Even then, tears continued to slide from her nose to the stone floor below.

“That… was _music_.” Morganthe howled again with laughter, and her guards quickly followed suit. “Krazzik, Zorovez, you’ve done well. _This_ is the spellbinder I’ve been looking for.”

“Thank you, my Queen,” replied the guards in unison. Both of them sounded ecstatic to receive such praise, and they left the room.

A few shattered breaths later, Rebecca remembered again why she was there. “Mil—” Rebecca tried feebly, but the pain still radiating up and down through her hand and forearm cut her off.

“You will hold your tongue!” Morganthe shrieked. Rebecca shuddered. To think, she had expected this initial visit to be fairly easy! How very wrong she had been…

Even with her hand searing as if it were on fire, however, she found that she still had a small measure of courage within her. “You d-don’t under… understand…” she whispered. “I’m h-here to… serve y-you.” The room was silent for so long thereafter that Rebecca began to wonder if Morganthe had followed her guards out of the throne room.

“What?” Morganthe’s voice was completely serious now; it was as though she had not been laughing at all.

Rebecca tried to calm her breathing, but every movement stung so deeply that she quickly stopped trying to catch her breath. Morganthe grew impatient and raised her foot again, as though threatening to crush the Theurgist’s other hand; Rebecca shut her eyes tightly in preparation for a new wave of agony, but did not move her uninjured hand away. “ _Please!_ ” she begged. “I… came t-to… serve…” A powerful feeling of dizziness was starting to smother the pain, but clouded her mind as well.

Morganthe narrowed her eyes warily. “Yes?” she prodded the teenager.

“Plea—” The lack of oxygen was taking its toll on the youth’s consciousness, and after one more failed attempt at breathing properly, she closed her eyes and shuddered.

* * *

_Pip, pip, pip…_

Rebecca awoke in a cold room made of stone blocks, brought out of her unconscious state by some slow dripping noise from within the room. At first, she thought she was hallucinating – perhaps the combination of prolonged hunger and thirst, paired with the ever-present stinging in her broken hand, had driven her crazy in her sleep.

She tried to speak, but her voice was gone. Remembering how much she had screamed during that meeting with Morganthe, she figured it was to be expected, though she was sure a glass of water would cure her throat straightaway.

She sensed she was the only living soul nearby, yet no tour guide was needed; a glance to the left of where she lay told her exactly where she was: in a dungeon cell. To her right, she saw a small window just below the ceiling. Lifting her head, she saw the source of the noise that had woken her.

“Water!” she whispered, her eyes wide and pleading, as though the falling drops could see, hear or understand how badly she needed them. She reached out as far as she could, too weak to push herself upright.

Thinking back to her deck of spell cards, she lifted her left arm to draw the Life magic symbol in the air above her, but it was no use without her staff. Worse yet, even if she had brought her staff with her, she had no healing spells to cast. _Is this the end?_ she wondered miserably.

As if on cue, the sound of rapid footsteps caught her attention, and soon enough, a female voice issued from beyond the cell door. “Are you awake?” called the unfamiliar voice.

Knowing she could not answer with her throat so dry, Rebecca knocked quickly upon the wooden slab on which she lay. She hoped her visitor would hear this and know that she was, indeed, awake.

The door soon opened to reveal another mantis, albeit one whose manner seemed somewhat gentler than those of the two guards who had most likely brought her here. “My orders are to escort you upstairs as soon as you come to. Follow me.” With that, she turned away.

Rebecca knocked again, calling the messenger back. She knew she couldn’t stand now any more than she could speak. “I can’t…” she mouthed, shaking her head helplessly. When the mantis only stared at her in confusion, the wizard touched the tip of her tongue to her lips and pointed to the shimmering puddle of water near her “bed.”

“You want water?” asked the mantis dubiously. Rebecca nodded hopefully. “I’ll… see what I can do…”

Rebecca waited… and waited… and then, she waited some more…

Finally, another, colder voice was heard from down the corridor. “This had better be important, Zarozinia! The Shadow Queen waits for no one!” A door banged shut, followed by the musical sound of running water.

“I’m aware of that,” replied Zarozinia. Soon, she appeared at Rebecca’s door, holding a mug of water. Rebecca reached for it, but Zarozinia hesitated, as though she were afraid of inciting an unexpected duel.

“Please…” begged the young wizard.

Zarozinia sighed warily, but came closer and held the mug out for Rebecca to take, which she did. There was barely enough water to fill the mug halfway, but as she gulped it down, she was immensely grateful.

“Thank you,” she croaked, her throat still painful, but better than before.

“Now come, spellbinder, and quickly!” Zarozinia hissed, taking back the cup as soon as she could tell that it was empty.

Though Rebecca was still unsure that she could even stand, it was out of gratitude that she tried. It wasn’t easy, especially without the use of her previously stronger hand, and she was, at best, wobbly upon success, but she did succeed. She followed Zarozinia as quickly as she could back to the throne room three floors up.

She arrived exhausted, but unsteady as she was, she immediately knelt before Morganthe when she saw her.

When Morganthe saw Rebecca entering the room, she gestured for Zarozinia to leave. The mantis hesitated, as though frozen in place. “Go, now!” the Queen commanded. With a stiff bow, Zarozinia did as she was told.

“Stand, pest.”

Rebecca gulped back her indignation and slowly stood herself up. It was hard as anything to turn her thoughts away from her head, still throbbing from being grabbed so roughly; or her hand, which hurt worse the more she moved it; or her back, which ached for the lack of a proper bed throughout the past two weeks; or her stomach, which still rumbled painfully; or her throat, which burned even mere minutes after her drink of water back in the dungeon. Still, her plan echoed faintly in the back of her weary mind, and she secretly vowed not to abandon it.

“What is your purpose here?” asked the Shadow Queen.

“To serve you, milady,” was Rebecca’s response.

Morganthe let out a shout of amusement. “Ha! You expect me to give you any chance at all, after the countless times you have attempted to destroy my vision for the Spiral? To stop me from improving it, rebuilding it?”

“Over the past couple of months, I’ve come to regret all those times I fought against you. I know you won’t believe it at first, but just let me prove myself to you. You’ve seen me fight many times; imagine if I were on the front lines, fighting for _you_ , and your great cause…”

“Oh, don’t make me laugh! Take a look at yourself, a filthy, tattered, defenseless beggar asking me for a military job! I can’t imagine what must be going through that presumptuous head of yours. The question remains, however: how did you find your way here, and why did you bother to make the trip? Admit it, _little girl_ , you came to challenge me in my own home, and with no wand! You call that proof of your usefulness?”

Rebecca’s knees were starting to quiver under a weight they could not carry for much longer. In an attempt to hide what might be taken as fear or anger, she dropped to her knees at once and bowed low until the tip of her nose was inches from the cold marble. Sitting up quickly, she shook her head. “I never want to fight you again,” she told Morganthe. “I left Ravenwood two weeks ago, and I’m never going back. I hated it there.”

Morganthe tilted her head to one side curiously, but her dark eyes remained the narrow slits they had been since Rebecca had entered the room. “Why? Ambrose treated you like his crown jewel, like his most precious pet.”

Rebecca’s face darkened as she pretended to relive memories of injustice that she didn’t possess. “He treated me like a bargaining chip, a pawn. He always sent me off on one errand or another, most – if not all – of which he could easily have done himself. I would say nine out of ten of these ‘quests’ were highly dangerous, and should never have been placed in the hands of a ten-year-old.” Noticing Morganthe’s bewildered expression, she explained, “I was enrolled at Ravenwood on my tenth birthday. Ambrose’s present to me consisted of a wand and a quest involving the defeat of several undead spirits and skeletons. Of course, I was all too happy to accept the job back then. Not anymore.” She shook her head in imaginary disgust, too distracted by her own lie to realize Morganthe’s eyes had widened with obvious interest.

Morganthe herself broke Rebecca out of her momentary daydream. “Well… I think you just might get what you came for, Rebecca… Dreamcaller, is it?”

“Dreamhunter, milady. Honestly, though, I’ve grown somewhat tired of that name,” she added, rolling her eyes.

“Hmm.”

“What do you think, milady? If you were to change it, I’d certainly raise no objection.”

“You’re asking me to choose a new last name for you?”

“If it pleases you.” Morganthe raised an eyebrow at the request, and Rebecca took the gesture as a warning sign that she was asking too much, too soon. Immediately, she sought to fix her mistake. She bowed again, this time, brushing her nose lightly against the floor. As she did so, her broken hand bent back just enough to send a shock of pain from her knuckles to the side and back of her neck. “ _Nguhh…_ ” she gasped, still quite tense, even as the pain began to dissipate.

“Your hand’s still bothering you?” the Shadow Queen surmised. Rebecca sat up and nodded. “Don’t make me regret this, child.” Suddenly, the bones of Rebecca’s right hand seemed to mend themselves together, and the painful, red-and-purple bruise that had formed there simply vanished!

Rebecca tried moving her fingers and, to her relief, found them utterly pain-free. “Th-thank you!” she sighed.

“Now, I want to be sure I understand you. You left Ravenwood without completing your education, did you?”

“That’s true, milady. I didn’t graduate.”

“In that case, you’ll be in need of a new professor. We shall see how quickly you learn under my tutelage, for a change.”

Rebecca gasped, slapping her newly-healed hand over her mouth. “You mean…?” Morganthe gave her a smug smile, which she took as a yes. “I… I’m speechless, I… Oh, thank you! I’ve never had a teacher so clever!”

“Of course, as you know, I have my own studying to do,” Morganthe interjected. “I should expect you to not get in the way of that.”

Indeed, Rebecca knew what she meant by ‘studies of her own,’ but it would do no good to argue with her now. “Of course not, milady,” she assured her.


	2. A Friend, an Ally

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A huge thank you to my beta readers, Firestorm Nauralagos and BuBuWinter!

_“Don’t allow yourself to grow comfortable just yet.”_

That had been Morganthe’s warning to Rebecca just before she had dismissed her from her royal presence. It was as much a reminder as a warning in Rebecca’s eyes, however – a reminder that she still had a ways to go before she could hope to successfully challenge and duel the monstrous royal lady.

As soon as she was out of Morganthe’s sight, she roamed the halls of the palace, wondering if she would be summoned to lunch anytime soon. Shaking her head fiercely to rid her mind of the distraction, she turned her attention forcefully to the décor of her new home. Wherever she had ended up, this part of the castle looked quite different from the wing she had been taken to the night before. Each room she passed was no less gloomy and depressing than the ones before, but at least in this general area, there were no spiders painted onto the walls. Instead, the Death symbol was embroidered onto large, blood red banners which were nailed to the walls and hung over every door.

“Spellbinder, wait!” A voice broke Rebecca out of her thoughts, and she quickly spun around to find the source. The mantis she recognized from the dungeons, Zarozinia, was hurrying toward her. “I’ve been looking all over for you! You should know better than to wander around aimlessly in this place,” she said.

“I’m sorry,” Rebecca told her. “I guess I just…” Zarozinia glared at her, and she promptly changed the subject. “Um, did you need me for anything?”

“Come with me!” Zarozinia hissed, clearly angry.

Rebecca followed her down a flight of stairs and through another wing of the castle, where Zarozinia flung open a refreshingly nondescript door to reveal a small bathroom-like area. Zarozinia waited by the door until Rebecca realized she was expected to enter, and did so.

Choosing to remain on the other side of the doorway, the mantis pointed a thin finger at a small pile of black-and-red clothes that were waiting on a plain, gray chair. “Change into those when you’re done,” Zarozinia instructed. “Don’t take too long.”

She closed the door, leaving Rebecca alone. The wizard stepped up to the sink and ran the cold water, using her cupped hands as a ladle to bring the sweet liquid to her cracked lips. Again and again, she drank, and again, her hands went back for more until she was full.

She had no idea how much time she would be allowed in there, so she wasted little of it. Noticing that the water was already waiting for her in the tub, she undressed as quickly as she could, hoping it was still somewhat warm.

Stepping in, she sighed deeply. She had grown numb, it appeared, so the subtle chill in the palace, but as she sat down, she could feel herself remembering what warmth itself was. It was invigorating, yet soothing. It was safety; it was happiness. It was exactly what she needed, right then and there. All her aches and pains seemed to melt off of her and sink down into the plugged drain.

She found a bar of soap resting on a little shelf that poked out of the wall, and before long, she was clean and smiling. It was hard to think of the danger she was in yet again when she was so relaxed.

The sound of rapping at the door woke up her sense of urgency. “Are you finished yet?” It was Zarozinia.

“Uh, I’ll be right out!” she called back, hurrying into her new robe and shoes. She opened the door, her smile disappearing abruptly when she saw that the mantis’ anger hadn’t gone anywhere.

“You should know that Her Majesty isn’t used to waiting for anyone.”

“She’s asked to see me again?”

“Everyone’s already in the dining hall, waiting for us. Do I have to tell you again to _come_?”

“I’m sorry,” Rebecca mumbled. She followed Zarozinia to the dining hall, where only two seats were left unoccupied. Zarozinia took hers, and Rebecca braved the curious stares of the older Morgantine servants to take the other, a few chairs down from the end of the unusually long table, where Morganthe sat.

“Now that we’re all here,” snarled the Shadow Queen, “shall we begin?”

With a stylish wave of her staff, the once-bare table filled with hundreds of plates and bowls of delicious-smelling food from worlds across the Spiral! Eyes wide and mouth watering, Rebecca reached out to take a roll of Zafarian spice bread when the goliath sitting to her right flicked her hand away, laughing as he did so. After glancing up at him through narrowed eyes, she tried again, but once more, he pushed her arm away.

“Little wizard,” he sang, “where’s your wand when you need it?” Many others at that section of the table started laughing as well. Rebecca chanced a glance in Morganthe’s direction, but it was clear the Queen was enjoying this confrontation too much to intervene.

Pursing her lips, Rebecca turned away from the great beast and reached out with her other arm for a serving spoon, hoping to claim some vegetables from the next plate to the left. She had scooped up a bunch of greens and brought it halfway to her own plate when the goliath shoved her in the back of her shoulder, causing her to drop the spoon on the table and make a mess.

“What is your problem?” Rebecca shouted, shoving him in return, although for all the good it did, she might as well have tried to move a boulder with a toothpick.

Naturally, her outburst backfired. With one powerful sweep of his gigantic arm, he sent Rebecca flying backward, her chair cracked slightly upon impact with the marble floor. Before she could react, some invisible barrier broke her fall a few feet away from the table and softened her landing.

“Let her be, Kur’zirak!”

Everyone at the table turned to look at the speaker in surprise. Rebecca looked, too, to find Zarozinia looking around at the others, apparently humiliated at all the attention she was getting for her act of honor.

Clearly, Morganthe did not find the mantis’ act quite so honorable, for she chose that opportunity to interject. “Behave yourselves,” she said, but she seemed to take no interest in Kur’zirak’s dishonorable acts thus far.

Rebecca knew Zarozinia had taken a great risk in standing up for her that way, and it was not in her nature to forget something like that. For the remainder of the lunchtime gathering, during which there were, thankfully, no additional problems, she tried hard to think of some secret way to thank her.

When lunch was over, she tried her best to avoid eye contact with Morganthe. She didn’t want to show her how much she hated her. She knew perfectly well why the Umbra Queen had remained silent until one of her elite soldiers was threatened. It was a test.

Morganthe was testing her loyalty. She just _knew_ it! She also knew that at Ravenwood, any member of the faculty, even the haughty Professor Drake, would have put him or herself in harm’s way in order to protect any one of their many students. And yet, Morganthe, who had only one student, couldn’t be bothered to say two words in that student’s defense until her own interests were put on the line? It was despicable.

_I need a new wand,_ she thought bitterly, _and soon._

* * *

 

_“The self-righteous fall to the wrath of the mighty.”_

_“He who teaches foolishness will never learn.”_

_“Where there is obedience, there is peace.”_

_“Where there is hope, there is treason."_

_“Massacre the rebel; end the war.”_

The handwritten lines went on and on. They were literally painful to read, but Rebecca knew there was real knowledge hidden deep within them. To decode the meanings behind each of these warped “wisdoms” was to see straight into Morganthe’s cruel mind!

Even so, she couldn’t keep her mind completely on the lesson. Her thoughts still wandered to the minute signs of _rebellion_ already visible within Zarozinia. Even such a brief outcry as Zarozinia’s had been was impossible to overlook. The sun had set over three hours ago, yet Rebecca still hadn’t found a decent opportunity to thank the young mantis, but the longer she was forced to wait, the more determined she became.

As it happened, Morganthe was watching her like a tarantula hawk, and seeing her pupil daydreaming, she brought her staff down against the floor, sending a powerful wave of Shadow magic across the floor like a single ripple spreading over a silver lake.

When it stung her shins, Rebecca yelped and snapped to attention at her desk. “I-I’m sorry, milady,” she stammered after a stunned pause. “I was… just thinking.”

The blood-red color of Morganthe’s eye shadow seemed to seep into her eyes. “Did your assignment require you to do very much _thinking_ , apprentice?” she asked.

“Uh—no, milady.” Rebecca hoped her answer was the correct one according to Morganthe.

Morganthe turned her gaze away from Rebecca to examine the head of her staff. “Close your book and turn your parchment over.” she began quietly, and waited for Rebecca to comply, which she did. “Now, recite your lesson.”

Rebecca gulped. Closing her eyes, she remembered what she could of the so-called “wisdoms” Morganthe was trying to drill into her with a pen. “Th-the righteous fall to the—” she tried, but a second, more powerful ripple of mana erupted from the Queen’s staff and hit her twice as hard as the first. “ _Aaugh!_ Please… milady…”

“I had considered getting used to that quaint little nickname… but now, I see no reason why you should receive any… _special treatment_. From this moment on, you will speak to me no differently than my soldiers or my servants. I am your Queen, and you will address me as such. _Do you understand?_ ” She roared the question, making the room itself appear to tremble with trepidation.

Rebecca, however, remained steady. “Yes, my Queen,” she answered at once, almost surprised by the lack of fear she had felt while Morganthe was screaming at her for her mistake. The Queen, coincidentally, was seemingly blind to her half-concealed resentment. Perhaps she thought it was actually a sense of duty taking hold. She would have been wrong… very, very wrong.

After a third but weaker Shadow hit, Morganthe ordered Rebecca to return to work copying lines from the thickly-bound Book of Morgantine Wisdom. This time, however, Rebecca memorized every word she read.

* * *

 

That night, Rebecca lay on the simple mattress in the shared bedroom she’d been assigned, drained of energy yet unable to find sleep. Too many things were bothering her, the most sickening being the lines she’d had to copy during her first lesson with Morganthe. Horrific, violent-minded and vindictive “proverbs” of Morganthe’s own creation were hardly thoughts she wanted to fall asleep to.

More worrying still, she remembered back to the one-sided duel that had nearly broken out at lunchtime, and she reflected on how embarrassed Zarozinia had looked when she’d successfully prevented it. Taking in a slow breath, she realized that there must have been more than humiliation at work there: namely, terror. Zarozinia knew the rules well; Rebecca had had no idea. _What am I doing here?_ she asked herself in thought amidst the silence.

* * *

 

The next morning, Rebecca was stuck in her second lesson with Morganthe, copying lines again, and again, her new professor was watching her with an impatient glare that made her feel especially uneasy. It felt as if Morganthe was trying to read her – to find telling significance in every movement Rebecca made.

As Rebecca copied from that horrid book, struggling to keep her expression neutral, she came upon a paragraph that disturbed her more strongly than any of the others she had read so far.

_“The minds of the weak are the pages of a blank book. The first pen to mark these pages conquers them. These first words written can never be erased. To make one’s mark early is to eradicate the idea of – and desire for – escape.”_

Rebecca grimaced in disgust. What Morganthe really meant could be interpreted in one word: brainwashing. That was surely a powerful tool… when all she had to teach was lie after lie.

Morganthe’s hard voice broke the silence. “You bear the appearance of a child who would rather be doing something… else.”

Rebecca looked up from the book, startled. “Do I?” she asked, trying to look bewildered through her dread.

Morganthe stood from her throne and slowly approached the young wizard. “Do these lessons not please you, apprentice?”

“I’m sorry, mil—my Queen. Forgive me; it’s just a lot to get used to at once. I grew up in Ravenwood, Your Majesty. Lessons were very different there.”

“First of all, child, let us do away with this delusion that you have ‘grown up.’ Must I enlighten you to the _mountains_ of evidence that it is a wishful lie?”

Rebecca cast down her gaze at once, hiding all traces of indignation. “No, my Queen. I understand.”

“Are you sure that you do? I’ll tell you this now: your overconfidence has caught my attention more than once before, though there were more pressing matters to address at the time. I should let you know, little one, that I plan on keeping a very close eye on you now that you are here. Look at me,” she ordered. Rebecca immediately obeyed, careful to avoid attracting further suspicion. “It’s not in my nature to abandon my plans for any reason.”

_Same here,_ Rebecca thought, struggling to keep herself from smirking. In reply, she said humbly, “No, my Queen, of course not. I’m very sorry to have offended you. It was a mistake, one I’ll be careful not to repeat,” she promised.

“Do not forget, child,” warned Morganthe, her voice cold as ever. “Secondly, I hope you’ve already grasped the fact that I _DO NOT_ aspire to mimic _Ravenwood_!” As her outrage grew and was released like pure mana in her words, a nearly invisible jolt of energy shot out like colorless dragon fire in all directions, and before Rebecca had the chance to gasp, the explosion of raw magic slammed into her with shattering force.

She shrieked in agony, having been knocked halfway to the far side of the room by the surprise attack. The metal chair she had been sitting in to write lay bent near the door, and her writing desk was in pieces, leaving splinters and bits of wood and twisted iron scattered across the floor. Rebecca knew as soon as she opened her eyes that the Shadow armor Morganthe had given her had just saved her life. If she had been wearing her old, custom-stitched Theurgy clothing, which promised no Shadow resistance at all, her mission and destiny would have been forfeit.

Still, the intensity of the spell had done its share of damage to her as well, new outfit aside. She felt sickeningly as though Morganthe had kicked her in the chest, fracturing her ribcage in at least two places, and both her legs ached terribly as well. “My… Queen…” she tried, but the words made her hurt even more.

“Silence, little coward,” Morganthe commanded. She seemed cheered up at the sight of the damage she had caused with a single spell. Admiring the debris strewn along the floor, she stepped slowly closer to her trembling charge. “Your lack of self-control will cost you your life if you do not abandon it now. I’m willing to consider this your final warning…” After another moment of staring down at the teenager, she returned to her throne and sat back down comfortably. “You are dismissed for the time being… brat. Return this afternoon for your next lesson.”

Rebecca groaned weakly and tried to get up, but her legs refused to support her. After a few failed attempts, she heard a moan of disgust from Morganthe’s direction, then felt as though she were being stretched into human string. It was a somewhat familiar sensation, for it was how she felt whenever she teleported somewhere, but it was strange, because she had no idea where or why she was porting in the first place. It hadn’t been _her_ idea!

A strong, magical pull of her threadlike body and a few short seconds later, she found herself in the bedroom in which she had spent the previous night. She felt like her non-threadlike, human self again, though her injuries still pained her.

All of a sudden, someone cried out in surprise from a few feet away. Rebecca’s eyes darted around to find out who had startled her.

“You!” It was Zarozinia, and she did not look pleased to see the young wizard at that particular moment… Narrowing her eyes in contempt, the mantis tossed the six plain, gray pillowcases she was carrying onto the nearest bed, one by one. “I see you got yourself in trouble again. I hope you don’t blame anyone but yourself.”

Rebecca winced. “Does your being angry at me have anything to do with yesterday, when you saved my life from that goliath?”

Zarozinia scoffed at the observation. “This is called frustration, spellbinder,” she spat. “And it might bear some connection to that. To think, I could be questioning Burrower spies with professionals like Roze the Mousehunter right now, but _no_. I’m stuck in here, making beds and mopping the floors… Being punished makes my day…”

“You’d rather torture spies than make beds?” Rebecca asked, cringing a little.

“I’d rather do _any_ kind of field work than be humiliated for helping a _new recruit_.”

Rebecca gulped. She hadn’t expected that for an answer. “Well, _field work_ would be a lot more dangerous, don’t you think?”

Zarozinia glared fiercely at her as if she had just been accused of weakness or cowardice, which had not been Rebecca’s intention at all. “Danger exists everywhere in Khrysalis. Surely, Her Majesty would have supplied you with that information…?” Rebecca shook her head slowly. “Anyway, _you_ seem to enjoy a life of adventure,” the mantis added bitterly.

That assumption hurt more than anything else Zarozinia had said. Taking a deep breath, Rebecca answered simply, “It’s no adventure. It’s my destiny.”

At these words, Zarozinia’s eyes shone with some kind of realization, and she rushed to the door. After scanning the visible corridors for signs of movement, she closed the door without making a sound and turned back warily towards Rebecca. “Your _destiny_ , spellbinder? Meaning what?”

Rebecca hesitated, wondering if this mantis was all that trustworthy in the end. She had just mentioned an interest in “questioning spies,” after all. Was it really worth the risk to answer such a question? Or, for that matter, was she already being questioned as a suspected spy?

Then, though, a new realization struck her. If Zarozinia would turn her in if she knew the truth, why had she made the effort to ensure that there was no one else within earshot? Wouldn’t she have been proud to show her fellow Morgantine subjects that she had just caught a traitor and singlehandedly saved her precious Queen?

“Titans…” Rebecca gasped. “You want her dead, too, don’t you?”

Zarozinia could only stare at her, shaking visibly as though struck by a peculiar combination of terror and reassurance. “I…” she mumbled, “I thought for certain…” She sighed sharply. In barely three seconds, she had sprinted across the large room to kneel beside Rebecca. “Tell me, spellbinder; speak the words clearly, so that there can be no mistake. You are here as a spy for Ambrose?”

“No,” Rebecca replied without hesitation. “Headmaster Ambrose doesn’t even know I’m here, and even if he does know somehow, he doesn’t know _why_.” Zarozinia made an impatient sort of noise, prompting Rebecca to explain _why_. When Rebecca did so, her voice was far less steady, for she had never spoken about herself in such a way in her life. “I’m here… as an assassin.”

Zarozinia nearly fell backward in shock, but she had tipped back just enough so that she was sitting, rather than kneeling. Before she could say anything in response, however, there was a loud click from the direction of the door. Zarozinia sprang to her feet before that door could open widely enough for anyone to see much within the room.

Guiding the door open with one spindly leg, a Painted Spider studied the bedroom and its two occupants. “Why was thissss door closed, mantissss?” she hissed quietly.

Zarozinia swallowed hard, but thought quickly. “I was unaware the door _had_ closed. I was too busy working to notice.” She hastened to the bed on which the empty pillowcases lay and picked them up.

The spider’s pincers snapped in warning, and her excess of eyes bore a hint of anger. “If you are sssso busy, why does your tassssk remain unfinished?”

Zarozinia appeared not to have heard the spider’s question, and so the arachnid shot a stream of long, silvery thread at her with enough force to knock her back – one end sticking to the side of her head, and the other wrapping itself around a nearby bedpost.

Zarozinia gasped in horror as, having tried to pull herself free of the glue-coated string with one hand, she unwittingly attached that hand to the string.

“She’s already being punished!” Rebecca protested at once, catching the spider’s attention. “Who gave you the authority to humiliate her like this?”

“What a tempting little dessert…” sneered the spider as she tiptoed closer to the young wizard and looked her over as if she were a tasty-looking morsel. “Perhapssss, Zarozinia has been working _too_ hard to inform you of my kind’s authority in thissss casssstle. I shall leave that to her. What I will ssssay is that you, lowly apprentissss, have no rightssss of challenge here. How dare you sssspeak to my kind at all?”

Rebecca looked the spider in the eye, still unable to force her legs to accept her weight. “ _Your kind_ should understand that any punishment Her Majesty deems sufficient should be enough to satisfy her subjects as well. If you disagree with me, perhaps you ought to take your concerns to the Shadow Queen herself.”

“You and thissss mantissss are her sssservants. We sssspiders are her nobles and royal court. I will suggesssst to the Queen that you receive a lesssson in the nature of a monarchy. Until then, sssspellbinder, you will remember thissss and resssspect your ssssuperiors.” Without waiting for an answer, the spider exited the room, her steps like the rapid tapping noises of hail landing on a rooftop.

Once the sound had become faint enough, which didn’t take very long, Rebecca struggled once again to stand up. She had to free Zarozinia… When tears began to stream from her eyes from the pain, she let herself fall, leaning her head against the bed with a strangled sob. “I’m so sorry…”

Zarozinia turned her head. “Why?” she asked, sounding miserable. “This isn’t your doing.”

Rebecca sighed helplessly. “If I hadn’t said anything to you, you wouldn’t have closed the door. Then that self-obsessed, eight-legged monster wouldn’t have given either of us a second glance.”

Zarozinia’s voice was quite a bit kinder than usual as she replied, “Don’t blame yourself, spellbinder. When you said what you said, you gave me much more than you took away.”

“What did I give you?”

“The greatest gift I could have dreamed of finding. You revived the hope I’d thought was dead in me.”

“You remind me of a friend of mine back at Ravenwood. He always used to say things like that.”

Something in Rebecca’s words seemed to have confused Zarozinia. “A friend, you say?” Rebecca nodded, a thoughtful smile forming on her lips. “What is that?” Zarozinia asked hesitantly.

Rebecca startled at the question. “You don’t know?” she asked sadly. “Hmm… A friend is… Well, I guess a friend is like an ally… It’s hard to explain…”

“Does that mean… Are _we_ friends? We’re _allies_ , aren’t we?”

Rebecca smiled. “Yeah… we are.”

Zarozinia pulled once more at the string, trying not to involve her free hand in the struggle. Feeling her sense of urgency returning, Rebecca scooted along the smooth floor to help her friend. “Wait, Zarozinia…” she whispered, “I can help…” As soon as she got close enough, she shut her eyes tightly and racked her brain for ideas. She knew that she couldn’t break the thread herself, not if Zarozinia couldn’t, but she had to do _something_.

It had more than crossed her mind to use a spell, but _which_ spell? Moreover, she was still wandless. However, she refused to be useless. Thinking quickly, she chose the only spell she knew that might help: Centaur. She put all the mana she could collect inside her to work, forcing the image of the card to materialize in her mind as clearly as if she were looking at the real thing.

Suddenly, she heard the familiar sound of hooves clopping gently on the floor in front of her, and her eyes snapped open to find the centaur she had summoned! She gasped; her spell, though surely less powerful without the help of her wand, had succeeded!

The centaur seemed mildly amused at her surprise. “You believed I would not appear so far from the battlefield?” he asked, watching her with a genial twinkle in his eyes. “I will never ignore your call, wizard.”

Rebecca smiled gratefully. “Thank you,” she said. “Zarozinia’s been trapped with spider silk; could you free her?”

The centaur turned to look at the mantis, who flinched apprehensively at the sight of him, and smiled kindly. “Worry not, friend of my friend,” he told her. “My magic arrow will not harm you.” Taking an arrow from the quiver slung over his shoulder, he took a few seconds to aim before sending it straight through the strand of silk. The full length of the spider silk dissolved on impact like a pinch of sugar in a kettle full of hot tea. With one last nod of encouragement in Rebecca’s direction, the centaur himself dissolved into a pile of autumn-colored leaves, which faded into the ground.

Zarozinia’s entire being glowed with gratitude. She jumped up and raced across the room, searching every cabinet and drawer within it. Finally, she found what she had sought: a small bottle of bright purple potion, which she offered to Rebecca. “Thank you for helping me, spellbinder,” she said.

As soon as Rebecca accepted and drank the measure of potion, the whole room suddenly began to tremble, while the air around them stirred with a thick darkness that drowned out every hint of light.

“Come quickly, apprentice!” Morganthe’s uncharacteristically jubilant voice echoed off the walls of the bedroom, making them vibrate and shudder eerily. “We have a most _unexpected_ visitor…” She sounded absolutely delighted to deliver this news, and when the soft light of the lamps once again conquered the room, Rebecca was left with a burning curiosity at the thought of who this visitor might be. Noticing the worry all over Zarozinia’s face, she wondered silently whether _she_ should be worried.

“Thanks for the potion,” Rebecca said with a shaky smile. “I’ll see you at lunchtime, I guess…” She got up quickly and made her way to the front doors of the castle, but no amount of courage she could have found within her could have prepared her to see just who was on the other side.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally posted February 28, 2014 on FFN.


	3. Shadowblade

Rebecca froze on the topmost stair. Her _visitor_ , it so happened, was the last person she had expected to see there, at the heart of the Shadow Web.

Yet there he stood – Merle Ambrose – just outside the Shadow Palace, complete with his pet owl, Gamma, who sat perched atop his staff.

“Headmaster, look!” exclaimed Gamma excitedly, gesturing towards Rebecca with one pearl-white wing. “There she is!”

Ambrose turned his attention away from Morganthe, at whom he had been shooting an irate glare, to Rebecca, who stared back at him, horrified. He took in her appearance for half an instant, visibly shaken by the colors of blood and darkness she wore, but he quickly recovered from the shock. “Oh, Rebecca, thank the Spiral you’re all right!”

“What are you doing here?” Rebecca whispered, feeling torn in half by the two opposing forces.

Though obviously startled by the question, Ambrose answered without delay. “Why, we’ve come to escort you back home to Ravenwood, of course.”

Rebecca shook her head at once. “No,” she said as firmly as she could manage. She backed away slowly, stopping only when she had reached the outer wall of the great castle. The doors, she realized, had already been closed behind her.

Ambrose stiffened somewhat, taken aback by her refusal. “I—I beg your pardon?”

“I said… _no_.” As painful as it was to remain here, she had a job to do. Her destiny had been woven in the fabric of the Spiral before she had even taken in her first breath; there would be no escaping it, now or ever.

The headmaster now looked quite as though he were bracing himself for a physical blow, making Rebecca cringe inside. “Why ‘no,’ Miss Dreamhunter?”

Before she could say a word, Morganthe stepped lower on the staircase, letting a proud smirk spread across her face. “My dear Ambrose,” she said smugly, “if you’ve come here seeking ‘Miss Dreamhunter,’ I’m afraid you’ve come to the wrong place.”

Rebecca’s insides quivered fearfully as she watched Headmaster Ambrose’s eyes widen in horror. “And what— _exactly_ —do you mean by that, Morganthe?” Rebecca knew well what the Shadow Queen had meant, however; she had decided on a new surname for her new apprentice. Rebecca felt sickeningly unsure of how she should react, what with the forces of Light and Shadow both present and keenly watching her.

“Perhaps you’ve not yet heard the news?” chuckled the Shadow Queen. “Of course not… Ambrose, the wizard you see before you is Rebecca _Shadowblade_ , by her own choice.” She laughed harder at the heartbroken expression the older wizard wore. “Yes, I think you’ve finally lost your mind.”

Emotionally jarred by the sound of her laughter, heartbreak swiftly turned to raw fury in Ambrose’s sky-blue eyes. “How vile you’ve become. What have you done?” he challenged her in a dangerously low tone of voice. “You’ve kidnapped her… Release your captive, Morganthe!”

“I didn’t kidnap her; she came to me! She will remain here as _my_ apprentice, and I never had the need to bind her here with any magic. I repeat, you fool, she is Rebecca Shadowblade of her own free will!”

“ _No!_ I won’t believe it. I cannot!”

“Very well, then. See for yourself.” She turned to Rebecca. “Go home, Shadowblade. That’s an order.”

“I… am home.” These were, without a doubt, the most painful words Rebecca had ever spoken. It was torture to see the heartache and disappointment in her mentor’s eyes.

“Oh, Headmaster…” Gamma gasped. “What will we do now?”

“What, indeed? This is a tragic day for the Council of Light. The two brightest stars have I lost in my lifetime…”

“Or perhaps, you never _owned_ us to begin with,” Morganthe countered.

The lies… How they scorched Rebecca’s heart! She couldn’t bear it anymore. She wanted to rip her plan to shreds, beg Headmaster Ambrose to forgive her, and follow him home to Ravenwood as he had offered. But she couldn’t. _She was home._ Until her plan was completed and the Spiral forever safe from Morganthe, this web of darkness was her home.

As she watched Ambrose depart with Gamma to return to _their_ home, she knew only one thing for certain: she was going to be sick.

* * *

 

Seconds later, the headmaster teleported to his house in the Commons, where a few students of various ages and schools had gathered in the hopes that he would speak with them upon his return. When they saw the grave expression he wore, all but one of them rushed outside, confused by such a sight.

The student who remained, a sixteen-year-old Thaumaturge, wouldn’t be so easily distracted. He cautiously approached the aging wizard, worried because he and Gamma had returned more or less alone.

“Sir?” A faint Marleybonian accent was paired with the handsomely gentle voice of the teenager.

“Mr. Skytamer… If I could have just a moment to myself…”

Despite Headmaster Ambrose’s reluctance to speak with him, the teenager stayed put, driven by a more powerful force. “But sir,” he persisted, “did you find her? Where is she?”

Avoiding the youth’s gaze, the headmaster sighed mournfully. “She is… lost.”

“No…” Tristan felt the world around him shatter. His mind scrambled for some tangible form of hope to cling to. What else could this mean? Still, the obvious answer crept up on him, cornering him. “D-dead…?” Tears began to sting his eyes and blur his vision.

_How did this happen?_ he wondered. He had done everything in his power to keep her safe in Wizard City – safe from the headmaster’s next quests – from the moment she had returned from Azteca, brokenhearted and exhausted. Still, she had been called away yet again, although the headmaster had sworn that he hadn’t sent her, and that he had no idea where she might be. That’s when he discovered that the only Spiral Key to Khrysalis the school still possessed was missing. It wasn’t long before they realized that it had been _stolen_.

For the first time since the elderly mage had returned to his house in the Commons, Headmaster Ambrose looked straight into Tristan’s face, a fierceness in his azure eyes that Tristan had never seen there before. “You don’t understand. She is alive.”

Before Tristan could begin to feel hopeful again, he started to shiver with dread. “Then why isn’t she here?” When the headmaster seemed unable to answer, Tristan gradually cast himself into a panic. “What happened to her?”

“It appears she was… unprepared to face the Shadows directly…”

“Sir, please!” Tristan pleaded a little too forcefully. Closing his eyes for a second to calm himself, he lowered his voice. “Just tell me…”

“She refused to come back.”

Tristan sank into the slightly worn chair that sat before Ambrose’s desk. “What…?” he gasped. “Why?” Even as the question rose in his throat, he realized he already knew the answer.

“I suppose I had underestimated Morganthe. Somehow, she’s convinced our young champion to switch sides.”

Tristan stared at Ambrose through narrowed eyes, disbelieving. “There’s no way that’s—” he argued, shaking his head.

Before Tristan could finish, however, Headmaster Ambrose interrupted him: “It’s what I saw, Mr. Skytamer. Now, if you wouldn’t mind stepping outside for a moment or two… I urgently need to get my thoughts together.” Then, seeing that Tristan had still made no move to exit his office, the headmaster added, “Please, Tristan, do me this one favor.”

Tristan lowered his gaze to the wide wooden desk that sat between them and, grudgingly, got up to leave. Before he was out the door, however, he paused and turned back. “I don’t believe it. I want to see for myself… I need a Spiral key to Khrysalis.”

“No… I’m sorry, Mr. Skytamer. We can’t afford to lose another Light to the Shadows.”

“I won’t be lost, headmaster.”

“Mr. Skytamer, you _must_ listen to me…”

“With all due respect, you can’t keep me from looking for her. I can’t just leave this alone. I’ll port to her if I have to!”

At these words, Headmaster Ambrose looked about as fed up with Tristan’s stubborn attitude as he had ever been. After glowering at his student for a moment, he sighed tersely. “If you are _that_ intent on going after her, then don’t ask me for a key. Go on, Tristan. Teleport if you must, but for goodness’ sake, ensure that you understand the risk before you go!”

“I do, sir,” Tristan told him. “That’s why I’m going.” Barely three seconds later, he was gone without a trace.

* * *

 

On her way back to the bedroom, Rebecca just wanted to collapse to the ground and fall asleep. The more she thought about what she had said to the headmaster, the less she wanted to think at all. But what else was there now to ponder? Nothing else seemed important, at least not until she pushed open the bedroom door.

Zarozinia had just finished making all the beds in the room, and she was on her way out when Rebecca went in. They both stopped short at the sight of one another. Rebecca tried to smile for her friend’s sake, but doing so just made her feel like even more of a liar…

Zarozinia watched helplessly while Rebecca’s attempted friendly smile dissolved into a teary-eyed frown. “I’m sorry, I…” the Theurgist sighed, covering her face with both hands.

“ _Tsssk…_ Who was the visitor?” Zarozinia asked uneasily.

Rebecca lowered her hands just enough to answer clearly. “Headmaster Ambrose.” The mantis’ eyes went wide, but she said nothing in reply, so Rebecca went on. “He wanted to bring me back with him, but… I can’t leave… especially now.” Letting her arms fall to her sides, she looked back up at her friend.

“Bring you back? So then, he didn’t even _want_ to you to come here?”

“It’s… complicated…” Rebecca said awkwardly, unsure whether she was up to explaining it all right then. In her eyes, it was by no means a story to be proud of. Zarozinia watched her with an air of mixed curiosity and concern, and so Rebecca explained further, hoping her friend would not begin to think harshly of her once she knew the full story behind her so-called _adventure_.

“Actually, he didn’t think _I_ would want to come. When he came to take me home, he probably thought I’d been captured in Wizard City and brought to Khrysalis against my will… but now, he thinks I hate him.” She shook her head sorrowfully.

Zarozinia’s curiosity seemed to falter at the confession. “Why would he think you didn’t want to come here?” she asked, sounding as though she were bracing herself for bad news.

Rebecca thought hard over how best to answer. “Well, see… before I came to Khrysalis, I was working in Azteca for the longest time, but at least there, I had someone guiding me through the whole quest, telling me where to go next, who to talk to, who to fight… And even then, I couldn’t rid Azteca of the Shadow hovering over it. I couldn’t save anything. I tried so hard to help them; I gave it all I had… but in the end, I didn’t save a single life. Everyone – everything – was _lost_. It was literally the end of the world, _their_ world. My failure cost them their home, if not their lives.”

Zarozinia’s gaze softened again as she listened. “Well, that doesn’t mean you’ll never succeed again. Everyone fails once. Most of us fail a lot more than once.” The mantis’ eyes flickered with a sort of humor Rebecca could clearly hear in her words.

“I hope Morganthe manages to fail sometime soon.”

“The Shadow Queen fails all the time. She just doesn’t feel the impact of her own mistakes – that’s part of our job as her subjects – so she never learns from them. She’s never felt the pain she causes every day, so she sees nothing wrong with causing it. At least, that’s what many mantises say.”

“You mean, there are others here who are… who are like us?”

Zarozinia’s gaze softened again at the question. She leaned a bit closer to Rebecca and said quietly, “ _Many_ others.”

“Not everyone,” Rebecca said sadly, thinking back to the night she had first entered the palace, dragged in by her hair, her cries ignored. Zarozinia’s head tilted slightly to her left in a look of cautious concern. Rebecca went on, trying not to sound as angry as she felt at the memory. “The two guards who took me inside my first night sounded perfectly eager to do Morganthe’s bidding.”

“Who were they? A couple of hundred-leggers, I’m guessing.”

“No, they were both mantises! Their names… Well, one was Krazz – he was the more violent of the two – and the other… Vez, I think. People have such unique names here.”

“Oh, Vez and Krazz!” Zarozinia exclaimed, sounding somewhat cheered up by the mention of them. “You’ve already met them?”

“As a matter of fact, I have,” Rebecca answered tersely, hoping she wouldn’t have to elaborate. Then, though, she reminded herself that this mantis wasn’t like the other two she had met earlier. She didn’t want to take out on her new friend any resentment she felt toward the guards, especially since Zarozinia seemed also to have been mistreated by higher-ranking Morgantine subjects. To group her with those others would be unjust and thoughtless, and those were not things Rebecca wanted to be.

Zarozinia seemed to understand clearly enough that Rebecca didn’t share her obvious interest in discussing them further, so she assumed what she could and explained: “They’re higher-ups. Soldiers. They can’t let just anyone know they’re on our side, especially strangers like you were. They have even more to lose than most of us do. But I’ve known them both since before we were first brought to live at the palace, back when we were still nymphs in Zha-Te-:Ke:-Zang-Zeeyun. Rest assured, they’re with us to the end, but like you and I, they must keep their true alliance a secret, for everyone’s sake.”

Rebecca thought this over and winced. If Zarozinia was right about those two, then they were better at this acting thing than she herself was. The idea frightened her more than anything else, because she had come to do just that: to act until she knew enough to vanquish the Shadows.

Still, she was already here, she was learning, and she had survived this long without the Council’s guidance. Leaving wouldn’t have been an option even if she truly did want to. Even though she’d barely touched the tip of the iceberg as far as discovering Morganthe’s potential weaknesses, she had gotten this far with only one friend to help her.

There was only one way to react: she would need to take a lesson or two from these mysterious soldiers. She would need to put her acting skills into overdrive.

For them. For all of them.

“I’ll need to step up my game, then, won’t I?”

Zarozinia glanced down at the cold stone floor. “What game?” she asked, looking back up at Rebecca, bewildered.

“It’s just a figure of speech. I just meant, I’ll have to give it my all. You know… try harder.”

“I thought you already were.”

“I’ve been trying… but it hasn’t worked very well so far.”

Zarozinia gave her an encouraging smile. “Well, as so many have said, Aquila wasn’t built in a day.”

Rebecca laughed quietly and nodded. “That’s true.”

“Yes. But it _will_ be worth the wait. The Fifth Column has been waiting for many years already for someone like you to arrive.”

“The Fifth… what?”

Zarozinia chuckled. “The Fifth Column. I’m actually relieved you haven’t heard of it. That may mean that _Her Majesty_ is less threatened by our existence than perhaps she should be.”

A smile spread on Rebecca’s face as she guessed, “Then it’s a group that…?”

“…opposes the Shadow Queen,” Zarozinia finished quietly, leaning in closer as she did.

Rebecca smiled brightly, knowing that she would not be on her own here after all. “As do I,” she said earnestly.

Zinia’s expression radiated warmth like a beam of sunlight. “I trust you, spellbinder.”

“I know you do, Zarozinia,” Rebecca said gratefully. “Thank you.”

“By the way… I never did catch _your_ name…”

Rebecca's eyes widened slightly as she realized that she'd never even introduced herself to her new friend. “I’m Rebecca Dreamhunter… although _Her Majesty_ wants to start calling me Shadowblade,” Rebecca added, grimacing at the thought.

Zarozinia lowered her gaze thoughtfully. After a brief silence, her expression brightened with the light of some intriguing discovery, and she said in a careful hush, “Then I know the perfect name for you: _Shadowhunter_!”

Rebecca smirked mischievously. “Ooh, I like that! What about you? Do you have a nickname?”

“Well, many in the Fifth Column call me Zinia, at least in trusted company…”

Rebecca nodded, still grinning widely. “That’s great,” she told her.

Just then, a multitude of bright white snowflakes draped in an icy-blue mist burst out from where Rebecca stood, and for an instant, she felt like her heart had stopped short. “No… Not again…” Even as the tiny, magical crystals fell lazily to the floor, melting as they did, there was no doubt in her mind of what had caused those snowflakes to appear, for there was only one Ice wizard who would have been able to teleport to her, or who would have even _wanted_ to…

Her heart began to break, but even so she backed up a pace, allowing the traveler to fully materialize. “Tristan… _Why?_ ” she asked him, her voice heavy with dread.

Tristan turned to face her, bewildered – and a bit hurt – by her odd greeting. “What?” he breathed.

“He warned you, didn’t he? The headmaster. He would have _told_ you to stay away from here!”

“ _Hush!_ ” hissed Zinia frantically as the sound of voices from outside came dangerously close to the door.

“What is it?” Tristan asked in a low whisper.

Rebecca clamped a hand over his mouth until the voices faded, her eyes glimmering with fear for his life. “You can’t be here, Tris,” she whispered back after removing her hand.

“Headmaster Ambrose was right about one thing… something _has_ changed you. But he thinks you actually _want_ to help Morganthe. How could someone so powerful not see the panic I see in your eyes?”

Rebecca’s voice cracked with emotion as she told him, “He tried to. Morg— _She_ did most of the talking.”

“Then I was right!” Tristan exclaimed. The look in his eyes was fierce and angry. “You _were_ taken prisoner! _Of course_ she didn’t want you to be rescued when the headmaster showed up! But she doesn’t know I’m here, Becca. She can’t stop you this time.”

“She can do anything she wants to, Tris—” Rebecca suddenly felt colder than a ghost. Before anyone had known to call _hush_ , the door had opened to reveal Morganthe standing there, watching Tristan as though thoroughly amused.

“True,” she sighed happily. “I see we have a second visitor today; how charming.” Turning briefly to look down her nose at Zinia, who stood frozen in fear, she commanded icily, “Return to your work.” The mantis scurried out of the room without a backward glance.

Tristan stepped forward, unafraid. “Release her,” he demanded.

The attempt was clearly feeble in Morganthe’s eyes. “Ah, but I already have… and here she remains.”

Rebecca gulped. Tristan brandished his sword at Morganthe, unaware that _he_ was the one frightening his girlfriend. “Liar!” he bellowed. “You vicious snake!” A silvery-blue mist began to form at the point of his blade, and it shot at Morganthe, but evaporated on impact, no match for her protective aura.

“Tristan, don’t! Stunning won’t do you any good; she’s too strong!”

“Let him stun,” Morganthe declared in her most sickeningly-sweet voice, a chilling calm radiating from her as she moved closer to him. “In fact, I get the feeling our young friend here – Tristan, is it? – is just itching for a good duel. Let us give him what he wants, shall we?” Horrified, Rebecca shook her head, her heart pounding, but Morganthe’s attention was entirely on Tristan’s only slightly worried face.

“But of course, this little bedroom is no place for a proper duel.”

“ _No_... NO! You ca—Please! I beg of you, my Queen, don’t harm him!” Rebecca collapsed to the floor, caring no more for her sacred plan now than Morganthe did for Tristan’s well-being. She wasn’t humbling herself for the Spiral’s sake this time; she was begging the beast to spare her beloved’s life.

Tristan grimaced and looked away. Thinking back for a moment, he pressed his left hand to the stiff cloth of his pocket, where a small center of calm heat seeped through. It was a tiny stone she had enchanted as a gift for him on their first anniversary of being together, a symbol of the love that he knew would never die.

He remembered with ease what she had told him under Bartleby’s shade on that hot, summer day, three and a half years ago: _“Hold it in your hand. As long as it stays warm, you’ll know you have a home in my heart. As long as you keep it with you, your heart will be my home. It will never grow cold, Tris, because I’ll never stop loving you. Will you keep it safe for me?”_

_“Till the day I die,”_ he had promised her. The memory of the soft, summertime kiss they had shared afterward made his lips tingle. He wanted to savor the memory, to live in its peaceful comfort for the rest of his life.

But even if he could, what kind of boyfriend would that make him? In what felt like slow-motion, he turned back to the girl who had offered him a place to call “home” when she’d learned he had never really had one. Returning to the scene before him – the way she clung so desperately to the bottommost hem of Morganthe’s robes, as if she were about to kiss them – he cringed sharply at the sight. Affection, vengeance and humiliation for her gnawed at his heart. He had never seen her grovel like this.

Repulsed, Morganthe kicked her away as though she were some worthless, mindless toy. “Unhand me, pest!” she snarled.

Tristan gritted his teeth at the cruelty Rebecca seemed perfectly willing to accept from Morganthe, the Shadow-obsessed woman she had spent years trying to defeat. All of this seemed so unlike her that he was beginning to wonder whether Rebecca – the only true friend he’d ever known – really had changed as drastically as the headmaster himself believed.

The very next thing either of them knew, they felt themselves being wrenched away from the bedroom, teleported elsewhere by no intention of their own. In the next few seconds, Rebecca recognized her surroundings. They were in the throne room, standing on an ominously familiar symbol that, to her, meant only one thing: the duel Morganthe had “offered” Tristan was about to commence.

Dread shook her; what could she do now to prevent this from happening? She still doubted her own ability to take on a duel against the Shadow Queen alone. How could she protect Tristan without giving up her duty to the Council of Light? How could she keep up her effort to save the Spiral if Tristan were to be killed? _Oh, Tristan,_ she thought as helpless tears stung her eyes, _why couldn’t you have just gone home when I warned you?_

Then, though, she remembered something crucial. “Your Majesty, I… I can’t fight him…” she managed to sputter.

Morganthe stared down at her apprentice, her look of mock surprise a translucent cover to conceal something even crueler. “Pray tell, Shadowblade: why is that?” she asked.

“I-I… I don’t have my wand… or my spell deck… I left them in—” she stammered, but before she could make another sound, Morganthe rolled her eyes and scoffed in exasperation, silencing the young Theurgist. She had already learned not to mention Ravenwood within earshot of the bitter mage, so she stopped herself from finishing her reply.

Tristan watched her sadly as she protested, for it was he, and not Morganthe, who had the answer. “Becca, here.” Slowly, he removed the backpack he’d been wearing, took out another, rolled-up backpack and held the second bag out to her.

Rebecca turned back to look at him, but at once, she closed her eyes, blocking out the sight. He had brought her backpack, with all of her best gear, back to her. She had left it in her dorm room for a reason! Not that she had planned for him, of all people, to port to her with it and get caught…

She was shaking even harder now, but beyond that, she didn’t dare move a muscle. Her plan, her inescapable destiny, the look on Zinia’s face when she’d realized they were allies, her recollection of all the Spiral had to lose if _she_ were to lose… All of this yanked at her from one direction while her love for Tristan pulled with all its strength from the other. She _couldn’t_ move.

“Becca…” Tristan sighed, continuing to hold out the bag. “it’s okay. Take it.”

Rebecca shook her head slowly, breathing hard. “No, Tristan…” She took a step back.

Tristan came closer and closed her hand around the bag, forcing her to take it in his own, gentle way. “ _Yes_. I’ve got nothing without my Life. You know that.”

_My Life._ That was what Tristan called Rebecca whenever the opportunity arose. To her, it was more romantic than any pet name or nickname anyone else could have thought up. In using it, Tristan wasn't trying to say Rebecca belonged to him; what he meant was that he needed her. She needed him, too, which was why she was so unwilling to allow this duel to take place. In his words, she was the warmth that had kept him alive through the darkest moments of his life at Ravenwood. Likewise, he was the breath in her lungs and the fire in her heart that gave her the strength to keep fighting for the Spiral. For years, _he_ had been her strength… until now.

“Oh, come now!” Morganthe interjected loudly. “Just get out your deck and your wand, apprentice, and let’s get this over with!”

Her hard voice sent a powerful jolt of terror through Rebecca’s nervous system, and she could feel it as physical pain that left her feeling strangled. Finally, unable to think straight, she acted on instinct alone, retrieving her wand and her spell deck. Once she had them both in her shaky grasp, she let her backpack fall to the floor with an audible _clump_.

_Oh, Tris…_ she thought, wishing she could say it to him out loud, _you should have left when I told you to!_

“That wasn’t so _very_ hard, was it, apprentice?” Morganthe said slowly, clearly mocking her hesitation. “Now, come here.” Helpless in her misery, Rebecca obeyed. Less than a second later, a great, resounding _crack_ of Morganthe’s staff filled the air as she slammed it fiercely against the stone floor. The ground shook slightly, and the faint symbol Rebecca had seen on the floor upon entering suddenly lit up like thin streaks of colored fire. Rebecca felt her entire body being pulled toward Morganthe’s side of the duel circle, even as every spark of consciousness in her mind urged her to turn around and fight alongside Tristan and defend him at all costs.

To her knowledge, Tristan had never dueled outside the Ravenwood Arena before. The rules were different in such a dangerous world as Khrysalis! People here were often notorious cheaters, and she had already seen the Shadow Queen’s arsenal of interrupts back in Ghost Avalon. How many new tactics had she picked up in the countless years since?

Despite her efforts to protect Tristan, she was drawn by invisible magic to the second spot on Morganthe’s side of the circle. Tristan directly faced Morganthe, standing alone behind the Sun symbol. Rebecca gulped back her tears, forcing herself to continue with the plan.

Meanwhile, Tristan glanced down at the spot in the duel circle upon which Morganthe was standing and managed an amused scoff. “Thirty-five thousand health points,” he taunted her with a smirk, “and you can’t even manage a couple extra power pips for the first round, Morganthe?”

“Why, yes I could, if I wanted them. But you see, I’m not the one who’ll be needing the power in this battle,” she sneered wryly in Rebecca’s direction.

“Your Majesty, please… Please don’t make me—”

“ _You will do as I command, brat!_ ” Morganthe boomed, and Rebecca cast a frightened look across the duel circle at Tristan, whose sense of humor appeared to have fled the battle. “Now choose your spell, and hurry!” Morganthe prodded her apprentice.

Panic seemed to slow time itself, but it was Rebecca who was too slow. Thirty seconds into the duel, she had made no choice; her turn was forfeit. The seven cards in her hand disappeared before she could get a good look at them. She had noticed a few healing spells, however, including one Rebirth, which she made a mental note to discard as quickly as possible during her next turn.

“A Tower Shield?” taunted the Shadow Queen when the silver shield materialized in front of Tristan. “I hope you plan on doing something useful next time.”

“Shut your mouth and focus on your own deck, spider witch!” snapped Tristan. Rebecca swallowed hard; her first instinct was to laugh in agreement with his remark, but she quickly remembered that their present situation was no laughing matter.

Meanwhile, Rebecca shuddered as a Balanceblade appeared above her head, circling around her, waiting to be activated. A sensation of added magical strength engulfed her.

That should have been all for that round, but Morganthe was too quick to allow the round to end normally, and as a cheat, she boosted Rebecca again, this time, with Spirit Blade.

At last, round two began. Rebecca’s cards reappeared before her, and she hastily dropped her Rebirth spell card to the floor, along with two wand hits, each worth a meager one hundred forty-five health points in base damage. Immediately, however, realization struck her: if she had saved those otherwise useless wand spells, she could have used them to get rid of all the blades Morganthe might cast on her, leaving Tristan more or less unscathed!

She passed her turn again, this time on purpose, and even as Morganthe was growing visibly angry with her inaction, she had to do it. Gaining the vindictive woman’s trust was central to her plan to defeat her, but her victory would be unbearably empty without the knowledge that Tristan was safe, too.

That turn, Tristan played a Life Shield; he looked down to see the green ward appear beside his Tower Shield, both spells swiftly circling his place on the battleground. Morganthe placed a Curse on him, then used Dark Pact on Rebecca by interrupt, somehow managing to be immune to damage from her own spell. Rebecca fought the wave of strength the new blade forced upon her, but it still managed to frighten her.

She was shaking terribly now. Round three began, and for the first time since the battle had started, Rebecca looked down just before her cards reappeared to see how many pips she had accumulated thus far. When she discovered that five power pips and two normal pips waited at the ready to drive her first spell, she turned away in horror. Had it not been for the mystical forces inside the duel circle holding her upright, she might have fallen backward in shock.

“You see that, apprentice?” barked the impatient royal nightmare. “You’ve had no excuse to wait this long. _Attack!_ ”

As she turned back to her deck, her mouth fell open. A shaky moan escaped her throat; in place of the three cards she had tossed down the round before, she’d drawn Lifeblade, a Colossal and, to her greatest dismay, Gnomes.

“This can’t really be happening,” she whispered, shaking her head.

“What are you waiting for _now_?” shouted Morganthe. “You have the attack! _CAST IT!_ ”

_That’s crazy…_ Rebecca thought frantically. _How does she know what spells I’ve drawn?_

Only three seconds remained of the allotted thirty when the Theurgist, having hastily drawn the Life symbol in the air with her weapon, pressed the tip of her staff into her Gnomes card, pushing it towards Tristan while her entire being opposed the decision. Her hands were shaking so badly that she almost selected Satyr instead. A lot of good _that_ would have done, since she couldn’t have healed him even if he had needed it… but it would have been a far less grievous mistake than the one she had just made.

The tremors in her hands and arms spread throughout her body until only the mysterious forces inside the duel circle were keeping her upright and on her feet. In all her experience, it would take more than luck to save an Archmage from such a heavily boosted spell. Once her turn began, and her spell activated all of those blades, the Feint and the added boost from her new Shadow gear, Tristan would need every bit of protection his own armor and shields could provide.

It appeared Tristan had chosen to use a Treasure Card for this round, for he had cast Leviathan, which every wizard knew was only trainable to students focused on Storm magic. However, he had not chosen to cast it at Rebecca.

All eyes were fixed on Morganthe as the great sea serpent prepared to attack, glaring into its soon-to-be victim threateningly, but Morganthe’s face softened into a thoughtful smile, as if she were trying to will the huge beast to attack Tristan instead. Her lack of fear only served to anger the leviathan further, for its eyes narrowed and it sank below the surface of its round pool, signaling that it was ready to attack. Its tail then rose from the cloudy water and slammed down onto the Queen.

To his disbelief, Morganthe didn’t even bat an eyelash. As the aquatic monster and its pool of water vanished from the center of the duel circle, she let out a slow chuckle. Rebecca and Tristan shared a look of alarm. Tristan had just used all of his pips on a relatively powerful spell—probably the strongest spell he’d had—and Morganthe had resisted it completely. Was the Shadowmancer immune to every spell of every school?

Rebecca had only seen such an occurrence once before: on Xibalba, just before the cursed comet had destroyed Azteca. An undead, undying Malistaire had appeared there at Morganthe’s command, and Morganthe herself had granted him universal immunity. Surely, to give such a seemingly impossible ability, the Shadow Queen must have had to possess it herself! How could she possibly be defeated now, whether by her assumed apprentice or anyone else? All this struggle—for nothing. And now, Tristan would surely be killed for his bravery, in order for Morganthe to ensure the destruction of the Spiral Rebecca had come all this way to defend! He would die… The thought pierced through her heart like a sword, and she found herself wondering if she could go on fighting for the Council of Light’s heroic cause if he were lost to her forever.

Grinning in her classic air of cruel overconfidence, Morganthe suddenly struck the floor with her staff, just inside the central portion of the duel circle, jamming the spinning arrow just as it was moving towards her, and effectively delaying her own turn. Tristan gave a sudden, startled outcry. Neither he nor Rebecca had ever seen such a tactic used before.

“Clever fellow, isn’t he?” Morganthe asked Rebecca, smug laughter ringing in her words. Rebecca didn’t look at her, for fear that her eyes would betray her worry that all of this would be in vain. Morganthe spoke again, as slowly as if she were addressing a badly-behaved toddler. “Know this: I will _not_ … be defeated… by a student… of Merle Ambrose.”

“You _were_ his student, remember?” Tristan argued without a moment’s pause, gritting his teeth at the thought of her treachery during her final years in Avalon. Rebecca had told him all about what had happened there upon returning to Wizard City with the Sword of Kings safely in hand. “He taught you everything you know!”

His words elicited an unexpectedly emotional reaction from the Shadow Queen. Her dark eyes flared with hatred; her breathing, calm and even just seconds earlier, now came in audible shudders; her hand loosened its grip on her staff somewhat, but then abruptly tightened around it again…

“You little vermin…” she breathed. “How _dare_ you speak to me about my past! In a few moments – when you are dead – and for eternity, I will _never_ let you rest!” By now, her voice had grown loud and shrill as she swore unending vengeance for Tristan’s heinous “crime.”

Tristan did his best to keep still, but he could feel himself shaking uncontrollably against his better judgment. Morganthe had started out as a Necromancer, after all, before Shadow magic had seized her interest. He had heard what she had done to Malistaire years after his defeat, twisting his soul beyond repair; would she do the same thing to Tristan himself? It was already clear to him that regardless of which attack Rebecca had chosen, his chances of surviving this duel were next to nothing; even if he managed to survive this next spell, he would not last much longer afterward.

Tormented by the threat, Rebecca gasped for air, as if she had been drowning in the frigid waters of her living, waking nightmare. “Tristan…” she moaned.

“Quiet, slave!” Morganthe hollered. Raising her staff once more, she brought it down in front of her with a loud _CRACK_ , releasing her hold upon time within the duel. The instant the arrow had come to a stop in her direction, the Myth symbol formed before her, and the ground beneath them began to shudder. Several large cracks erupted along the battleground, spitting jagged bits of earth and stone into the air, the most powerful of these explosions crashing directly into Tristan. His Tower Shield activated, along with the Feint. The blow forced him backward a little, hitting him for just under two hundred damage.

Stepping back into his spot on the edge of the circle, he shuddered. As far as he could tell, the point of casting Earthquake was rarely to injure one’s opponent, but rather to strip them of all defensive spells and offensive boosts. Sure enough, his Life Shield shattered, unused, leaving him protected only by his armor, which he had acquired about thirty levels ago.

But that wasn’t all Morganthe had up her sleeve for him… It appeared that she had used an interrupt early to cast her Earthquake; her actual turn was only just starting. This time, she replaced the unaltered Feint she had used up with a Potent Feint. He looked up at her, horrified, but unlike before, there was no mocking smile on Morganthe’s face—only the intense hatred he had kindled, the tender nerve he had struck.

_Don’t let her see your fear,_ he told himself, but all he had to hide it with was sadness. He had come to rescue his girlfriend, to bring her home safely… and he had done no such thing.

When the first gnome appeared, Rebecca closed her eyes, but she couldn’t block out the high-pitched voices and laughter as more and more gnomes joined the first in the center of the duel circle. She knew what was happening – she had cast that spell many times before, and had seen it in action. She could see it in her mind even as it was happening only a few feet away, but she didn’t want to see it at all.

She opened her eyes just in time to see hundreds of the tiny creatures combine into one giant gnome, whose form towered over her head and shone golden for an instant. Having seen that glow many times before, she knew exactly what it meant… It was the identifying mark of a Critical. “Tris…” she whispered feebly, feeling very lightheaded.

The gnome’s roar echoed through the Theurgist’s mind. One by one, her blades activated, followed by the new Feint, and all the while, she prayed he would block her Critical, but when the gnome raised his gigantic fist, she knew it was already too late.

With a sharp crunch, both the gnome and the duel circle slowly disappeared. Without the circle holding him upright, Tristan’s head fell to one side, his tightly-shut eyelids relaxed but did not open, and his knees buckled under him.

Once the back of his head had landed on the unforgiving marble floor, he faded from view amidst a hum of mana.


	4. The Boiling Lake

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Attention, young wizards! I have an announcement to make, but I'm going to put it at the end, because there's a spoiler from this chapter in it. So read on, if you will, to the end...
> 
> A HUGE thank you to my awesomesauce beta readers, Firestorm Nauralagos and BuBuWinter, and my good friend, Jesse, for their feedback and support for this chapter.

The instant her banishing spell had disposed of that treacherous boy, a piercing shriek drew Morganthe’s attention away from her victory. Slowly, she turned her gaze to her apprentice, who had also crumpled to the floor, and eyed her curiously. Just as the scream ended, the girl drew in a noisy breath only to scream again.

 _What nonsense is this?_ wondered the Shadow Queen. _The duel is over; we won. This child didn’t take a single blow. What reason could she have to make all this fuss?_

About a minute later, the screaming finally stopped, and Rebecca simply lay shivering at Morganthe’s feet, whimpering feebly. Her tear-soaked eyes were weary-looking and unfocused, and her lips trembled as if she wanted to scream again, but alas, her voice had already abandoned her from overuse.

Wrinkling her nose in revulsion, Morganthe struggled to comprehend Rebecca’s reaction to this first real accomplishment under Her Majesty’s instruction. Then, though, when she looked at the bigger picture, all the puzzle pieces started to fit together…

She recalled Rebecca’s frightened sobs as she had pled with her Queen to spare that wretched boy’s life, over and over again, before _and_ during the battle. She had waited far longer than necessary to attack him, or to cast anything at all. And when she had attacked him, visible signs of fear had overtaken her appearance, followed in the end by uncontrollable shrieks of agony.

Somehow, she decided, there must have been a magical connection between the two of them, where if one was harmed, the other would feel the same pain. What a cruel enchantment that had turned out to be! Morganthe scoffed in disgust at the idea.

Her eyes widening out of shock, she inhaled sharply and turned away, her gaze falling upon the throne she had claimed so many years ago. Already, it appeared, small fragments of her own impenetrable defenses seemed ready to crumble. She was clever enough to know that the Leviathan spell she had been “attacked” with had had nothing to do with it. Her armor was intact and as strong as ever. The damage done had instead affected the wall she had built around her otherwise vulnerable soul throughout her childhood, which she had maintained and reinforced for well over a century: the brick-and-iron barricade designed to keep her heart out of the way, the heart whose very existence even _she_ had forgotten about. That had been so very long ago…

Approaching footsteps announced the presence of another nearby, and the Queen lifted her head higher, forcing her face into the most domineering expression she could manage before turning to face the millipede who waited there, standing at attention.

Gesturing dismissively at her still-trembling student, she told the guard plainly, “Take her away.” Turning her back to both of them, she stepped up to her throne and sat down.

“Where to, my Queen? The dungeons?” guessed the smirking guard eagerly.

“To her bedroom, you imbecile!” she snapped.

Her tone startled the guard, as did the sting of her words, but he seemed to recover from the shock more easily than she, for something deep inside her seemed to stiffen in disbelief. Where had _that_ outburst come from?

“Yes, Your Majesty,” the guard said solemnly, bowing in apology.

As he guided Rebecca roughly out of the room, Morganthe studied the spider-carved head of her staff. _What’s happening here?_ she wondered. _What is this storm descending on my world? Or… is it descending on me alone?_

Whatever it was, and wherever it might lead, she knew from whence it had come. This growing uncertainty was hers because that infantile boy had reminded her of a detail nobody should have been trusted with. She assumed that Ambrose had told him that she had once been a mere apprentice herself, _his_ apprentice. She was doubtful, however, that anyone had known to mention that she hadn’t _always_ hated him. She had been very careful not to give even her own pupil that information.

_“I am so very disappointed in you.”_

Morganthe sighed hard through clenched teeth as Merle Ambrose’s voice reverberated through her mind. What had it been that had disappointed him then, and poisoned his view of her ever since? The same quality in her that, until that day, had always made his eyes gleam with pride: curiosity.

And yet, as hard as he’d taken it, that insatiable thirst for knowledge had granted her every spell, ability and privilege she had today. Once a wide-eyed, youthful student, she had emerged from her troubled adolescence a conqueror… a Queen! She was _royalty_ , Merle and his flawed Spiral be damned!

Her tense lips parted to reveal gritted teeth. She remembered now; she had made a vow during the battle against Merle’s _new_ rising star that she had not thought to keep afterwards. Now was no time to let such a promise go unfulfilled. She rose steadily from her throne, gathering the necessary mana from within, and stepped forward a pace. Raising her staff so that its head was level with her gaze, she focused her magic at a set point on the floor several feet away.

As expected, a swirl of spinning energy appeared before her upon the spot her eyes had chosen, bringing an eager sneer to the Queen’s face. As gradually as it had come, however, it dissipated, leaving no trace of its brief existence. Morganthe’s smile was gone in the blink of an eye. “What?” she hissed.

Shaking her head, she considered what had gone wrong. _What would have prevented—? Wait a minute…_

She turned her head to look at the part of the floor that had been her most recent battlefield, searching fervently for some clue that her guess had been wrong. Breathing heavily, she walked back over to where the now-dormant duel circle lay and inspected it thoroughly. All she could find there was the faint outline of the circle itself. No sign of bloodshed, no lingering aura of death…

_No… It can’t be… How is that possible? We won the duel!_

Morganthe’s mouth fell open; she understood now, and her rage was mounting too swiftly to control. A powerful shriek rose up from her lungs, and even as she set it free, her murderous fury only continued to intensify. _“NO!”_

Gradually, clarity took the place of emotion, allowing her to catch her breath. However it had happened, however unlikely the odds, her spell to raise him from death had failed for a very specific reason…

“He’s alive.”

* * *

 

Tristan woke up on the grass beside the shimmering lake in the Commons, and right away, he knew he’d lost the battle. Ignoring the curious stares from his fellow students who had gathered around him, he tried to push himself up into a sitting position. It was then that he noticed that the lower half of his body appeared to be missing in action! Lifting his head to see if he was actually halved, he was only minimally relieved to see that his legs and feet were still attached to the rest of him. Grunting in effort, he tried again to convince his legs to bend, to twitch, to do anything—but it was useless. How could he control a limb he couldn’t feel?

While his legs were as good as gone, his heart was anything but numb. He could remember how Rebecca had tried to convince him to leave Khrysalis before it was too late, how she had pled and wept in protest when Morganthe had suggested a duel, and the seemingly distant sound of her uncontrolled screaming as he felt himself slip out of consciousness. However, it had been the fist of _her_ gnome, and _her_ spell, and _her_ staff that had inflicted this certainly irreparable injury. It was difficult to put the blame on Morganthe, where deep down, he knew it belonged, when the final decision to attack him had been Rebecca’s.

 _I might as well stay right here,_ thought Tristan. Then, a bitter chuckle crept up from his shattered heart. _It’s not like I have a choice._

Just then, something beside him caught his attention, burning his side. With a great effort, he pushed himself up on his elbows so that he could figure out what was scalding him, and he narrowed his eyes. The enchanted stone had burnt a hole right through his pocket, and it now lay on the damp soil between him and the lake. He took it in his hand and, thinking of his promise to her, squeezed it gently, bringing it slowly to his chest. His whole upper body shook with silent tears that soaked his eyelashes but fell no further.

When he opened his eyes again, their gaze no longer betrayed a grieving heart, but a hardened one. All of this hurt him so deeply that to lay blame seemed the only way to cope. It was her fault. To defend her against that idea was unthinkable. She had made her choice.

Realizing he was still holding the hot pebble, for that was all it was to him now, he tossed it into the lake.

_“Will you keep it safe for me?”_

_“Till the day I die.”_

As far as she could be concerned, he _was_ dead.

* * *

 

“You were right, headmaster.”

Tristan sat before Ambrose, his lips quivering, but he fought the temptation that threatened his composure as valiantly as he could. He could feel Headmaster Ambrose watching him sadly, but he couldn’t bring himself to make eye contact with the man, not yet. Not until he had regained control of his emotions.

“I know it hurts, Tristan.” Tristan shook his head, but before he could argue, the headmaster defended his statement in the same gentle tone. “No, I do.” He sighed deeply. “The relationship between Rebecca Dreamhunter and myself was very different from yours; I understand that. But I, too, had much invested in it, and in her.” After a pause, he let out a small chuckle. “I admit, I often thought of her as my own daughter.”

“You’re talking about her as if she’s dead, headmaster,” muttered Tristan darkly. “This is worse.”

Headmaster Ambrose seemed ready to reply when they both heard a startled cry from out front. “Headmaster, headmaster!” squealed a much younger wizard, probably ten or eleven years old, who had just burst into the room. “The lake is boiling! Out in the Commons—It’s really boiling!”

Headmaster Ambrose stood in alarm. “Pardon?” he gasped before hurrying to the door. “Do excuse me a moment, Tristan…” he called over his shoulder as he rushed out.

While the strange news had surprised Tristan well enough, he was certain he knew what was causing it. It was that stone Rebecca had given him. Helplessly unable to follow the other two out of the house, or even to watch the commotion from where he sat, he was left only to listen as best he could.

That wretched stone! But why was it so hot now? How could one enchanted rock cause an entire lake to boil? Would it remain under that lake forever, or was there some safe way to retrieve it?

“Everyone, back away from the water!” shouted the headmaster, his magically amplified voice audible over the gasps and shouts of the students in the area.

A minute or so later, the cries of wizards in the Commons were replaced by a wave of cheers and applause. “What in Bartleby’s name is this?” Ambrose muttered, his voice still amplified, perhaps by accident.

“That looks like the stone Tristan Skytamer threw in,” said one boy.

“Do you suppose he knew what he was doing?” asked another.

“Why else would he have such a thing to begin with?” suggested the girl who had burst into the headmaster’s house just a few minutes earlier.

“Young wizards, please!” Professor Wu’s calm voice seemed to soothe the crowd a bit. “Let’s all just be glad that the lake is starting to heal. Did any of you get burned? Professor Wethersfield and I will be happy to heal anyone who’s hurt…”

Tristan winced as the headmaster’s front door closed suddenly. “Oh, my goodness!” Ambrose whispered, returning to his desk with the stone suspended at the center of a bubble-like protection spell. “I recognize this magic! It is fine spellwork, indeed, but it is a shame that it caused such panic in the end. Tristan, is this yours?”

Tristan nodded guiltily. “Becca gave it to me years ago,” he explained. “But no, I didn’t know it would do _that_.”

“Quite understandable. I gather you assumed that the water would cool it down?” For some strange reason, the headmaster was smiling just a little.

“Um… I don’t think I even cared about it at the time, I was so upset. But I didn’t expect it to heat up the lake so much. I’m sorry.”

Merle Ambrose didn’t answer. He was slowly lowering the stone into the scrying pool in a far corner of the room. Tristan wished he could get up and walk over to see what would happen, but as it turned out, there was no need. Once the protection spell was lifted, the stone fell into the scrying pool and a moving image rose from the surface. Both wizards watched as the image cleared up a bit, showing Rebecca lying face-down on her bed, her entire face wet with tears. A red mantis sat beside her, watching her anxiously.

_“He’s dead…” the Theurgist sobbed._

_“It was either him or you. You did what you had to do! Hush…”_

_“I wanted him to kill me, Zinia! I can’t do this; I can’t just forgive myself and move on. Titans, I’ll never forgive myself! TRISTAN!”_

_“Shh, stop screaming! She’ll hear you if you keep this up…”_

_“I don’t care. I don’t care about the plan anymore. I don’t care about anything. I wish I was—”_

_The mantis frantically grabbed Rebecca’s arm. “DON’T… SAY… THAT!” she shouted. After a wary glance at the door, she lowered her voice again. “When I first heard you sucking up to the Shadow Queen, after everything you’d done to try to stop her, I thought I hated you. I honestly thought you a coward for trying to join her. Tssk… But you’re not a coward, spellbinder. I was wrong. You have a strength and a destiny that no mantis has ever dreamed of! You will defeat her, Shadowhunter. But if you give up now… then we who would give anything to end her rule will have nothing left to hope for.” Rebecca let out a mournful sob, but couldn’t speak._

_Zinia appeared to rethink her approach. “If you truly loved him, spellbinder… you mustn’t let his death be in vain. Keep to your plan in memory of him, and honor his sacrifice.”_

The image slowly grew fainter and fainter, until it disappeared completely from view, and the room was silent. Tristan, who had been disbelieving at first, now stared wide-eyed at the scrying pool. “But I’m alive… Becca, I’m alive!” he shouted out to her, but the image did not return.

“She can’t hear you,” Ambrose informed him grimly.

Tristan panicked, his tears threatening to sting his eyes once again. “Bring her back!” he implored the headmaster frantically. “I have to tell her!”

“Even if I could bring back the vision of her, she still would not be able to hear you.”

“But… sh-she said she wanted… Do you think she really meant…?”

“What she said was, at least to me, a clear signal that she needs our aid,” the headmaster told him firmly. “She spoke of a plan, Tristan, a plan to defeat the evil that Morganthe has become.”

“We… I… Headmaster, I can’t walk… How can I help her now?”

“You can start by telling me how you were injured. I need to know if you were infected with a poison, because if you were, the healing process will be much more lengthy, and quite possibly painful. We need to handle this carefully.”

“You mean… I might heal from this?” Tristan asked hopefully.

Ambrose gave him a look that said quite plainly: _This is no time to dawdle._ “Please, Tristan,” he said wearily.

“I… Well, we were dueling, sir. I got hit by a Gnomes spell. A really powerful one.”

The headmaster’s bewilderment was written clearly on his face as he exclaimed, “Gnomes? Why, that’s odd. With whom were you dueling?”

“Becca and Morganthe. I guess Becca had waited for as long as she could, with Morganthe watching her deck the whole time, but… _she_ cast the spell that knocked me out. Wait… how _did_ I survive?”

“When the spell hit you, did you feel… dizzy at all?”

“No, not really. I almost felt like I was teleporting. I… _That’s_ weird…”

“What is?” Ambrose asked, sounding urgently interested.

“It was _exactly_ like I was porting! Except… _I_ didn’t do it…”

“By Bartleby!” exclaimed the headmaster. “Rebecca cast a banishing spell? But how? And directly after casting Gnomes… She would have needed all of her available mana ready in order to cast such a spell inside a dueling circle… Impossible!”

“Sir, whatever happened that sent me back here, Becca couldn’t have done it. She was too hysterical; she was screaming her lungs out just before I lost consciousness, and that’s when I felt myself port.”

“It could only have been Morganthe, then… But why would she do something so… merciful?”

Tristan cleared his throat as though trying not to laugh at the idea. “Merciful? Sir, I can’t walk, remember?”

The headmaster held up an index finger in a just-a-moment-there gesture. “For whatever reasons she might have had, Mr. Skytamer, from what you’ve told me, she spared your life. That’s very unlike her. The Morganthe I’ve known for well over one hundred years would never—”

“You’ve known her for a hundred years? How old _is_ she?”

“Tristan, please try to focus.”

“Sorry, sir.”

Tristan watched uncomfortably as the headmaster stood up and began to pace. “I can think of no other way,” he said quietly, stopping short in the middle of the room. After a thoughtful pause, he rushed to Gamma’s room and retrieved a black-bound book the size of a small tabletop, which he placed on his desk, scattering dust and papers all around.

Tristan coughed. “Sir,” he gasped, pointing at the book’s front cover, “that’s the Shadow Palace, right?”

“Yes, Tristan. Over a century ago, in the Khrysaline ‘Old Times,’ it was known as the Palace of Dynasties. After the Hundred Year War began in Khrysalis, with her forces causing as much trouble and distraction as they could, Morganthe was able to overpower the seven towers’ defenses easily. If any in the palace survived, they did so because they joined her forces, and for no other reason. Now, it serves as the central base of her domain. Her _Shadow Web_.” The look on Merle Ambrose’s face was of utmost disdain, his gaze aimed downward at the book. Slowly, as though expecting to find something dangerous, he opened it to a spot several pages in.

Tristan watched as the headmaster studied the page spread before him, which looked strangely like faded blueprints, or some kind of simplistic map. Upon closer examination, the map revealed tiny inscriptions along the borders in some unfamiliar language:

_NOITAN IT SEDRU UWOH S’LIWI ~ YENRU OJRU EM’LET_

“We seek Rebecca Dreamhunter, Promethean Theurgist,” commanded the headmaster in a firm, clear voice.

Tristan’s eyes grew round with awe as tiny droplets of the ink on the page began to vanish without leaving a trace. For a moment, Tristan waited eagerly, hoping the ink might reappear to form a different image, but the pages remained blank. “Sir, what—?” Tristan began, but Ambrose held up a hand, and the teenager fell silent once again.

“Rebecca… _Shadowblade_ ,” Headmaster Ambrose tried, grimacing as though the name itself pained him. As though the book possessed the consciousness to doubt its owner, which Tristan decided it must, it did nothing for a second or two, but eventually decided to obey. As slowly as the ink had disappeared, it reappeared to form a new image. This time, the image depicted the Great Tree, Bartleby. Soon enough, the tree’s leaves and branches began moving and swaying as though brushed by a breeze. As the inaudible wind blew harder, a single leaf broke free of its place on the topmost branch, fluttering around playfully until a raven with bright red eyes came into view and snatched the leaf out of the air with its beak. “Morganthe…” whispered the headmaster, and all of a sudden, the moving image started making sense. What they were seeing was a sort of silent prophecy, Tristan realized. The leaf represented Rebecca; the raven, her captor.

As they continued to watch, the page turned as if blown into place by a nonexistent breath of wind. On the new page, the leaf seemed to drag heavily along the dirt, tumbling bleakly as it went, until it came upon a smaller bird, a cardinal with a strangely-bent wing. Very different from the raven, the cardinal gently nudged at the leaf with its tiny beak until the wind picked it up again. The red-feathered bird flew alongside the windblown leaf until a large, black raven feather pierced the leaf, rendering it permanently unable to fly.

Again, the page turned, but no image appeared. Instead, the entire page was covered in pitch-black ink. After a few more seconds of that, all of the pages suddenly began to rustle, as though the room were being attacked by strong but aimless gusts of wind that neither Tristan nor Headmaster Ambrose could feel. It was as if the book itself were shuddering.

Ambrose closed the book carefully, his expression telling too much: the situation was more dire now than ever before.

Tristan felt a chill run down his neck and most of his spine as the prophecy came to a close. “Sir, what was that last one?” he asked cautiously.

Ambrose’s eyes were fixed on a nondescript spot on the wall by his desk, as though he, too, were still trying to process what he had just witnessed. “Only darkness,” was his reply. His eerily pensive voice made the urgency of the matter all the more clear.

Tristan’s heart sank. “Oh,” he replied quietly.

The headmaster continued, the usual signs of hope now gone from his tone. “Only darkness lies ahead if we allow this prophecy to fulfill itself. We must do all we can do to prevent it.”

“How will we prevent it, sir?” Tristan asked.

“We shall begin,” he answered, “by returning to Khrysalis. Of course, we shall need to plan carefully before our departure, but… first things first.” He rummaged through a cupboard full of potion bottles and jars of unfamiliar reagents, then pulled out three of them, placing the first two on the desk before retrieving the third, and then one tall, empty glass. About two cups of a clear, olive-green potion was poured carefully into the glass, followed by two large drops of a foul-smelling black liquid, which turned bright pink on contact with the first potion. Then, a tiny pinch’s worth of something that looked like moist, earth-colored sawdust went into the brew. Finally, with a sudden flash of bright, white light, the potion stirred itself, and its appearance shifted once again to a bubbly, oceanic blue.

Tristan reached forward eagerly to take the potion, suddenly feeling very thirsty. It tasted like fresh blueberries and iced tea, a very refreshing and enjoyable combination. Even as he downed it, he could feel the numbness in his lower half gradually leave him. By the time the potion had been fully drunk, he could even move his toes in his boots!

His happiness was short-lived, of course, for the sorrow behind the headmaster’s smile brought him back to reality. They had work to do, and no time to waste.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If, while reading this chapter, you were wondering what "NOITAN IT SEDRU UWOH S'LIWI ~ YENRU OJRU EM'LET" means, here's the scoop. I did a little Mirror of Erised-style trick (Harry Potter reference) with the following text: "Tell me your journey - I will show you your destination."  
> Hint: read it backwards, change both of the apostrophes to L's, and turn 'u' and 'ur' into 'you' and 'your.' :) It works... almost. :) I tried really hard to make it cryptic but not entirely random.
> 
> * * * Announcement * * *
> 
> With the help of a couple close friends, I've decided Morganthe's Apprentice is going to be the first in a series of four stories. This one, of course, focuses on Rebecca's journey into the Shadow Web; the next will center around Tristan; the third will be about Morganthe's troubled past; the fourth will tie all of these up with a story about the Spiral itself, and will explore the history of one Merle Ambrose. These aren't necessarily in chronological order, but... Well, you'll see. :D
> 
> This is a highly ambitious project for me, since it's been about 15 years since I've written a story to completion. :P Yup... so I'm going to need your input and support for this to work! Here's hoping, wish me luck, and have a wonderful day!


	5. What Forever Means

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally posted on Feb. 7, 2016.
> 
> Many thanks to my beta readers (Firestorm and BuBu), and to everyone who helped me with this chapter: AFF, Ammaarah, Arnel, Austin, Ian, Jesse and Waffles. :) If I'm forgetting anyone, please let me know so I can update this, and accept my apologies for my subpar memory.

When Rebecca finally fell asleep that night, her dreams were a mess of misery, fear and self-hatred – even more so than usual. Her tortured mind couldn't help but go back to two months earlier, when the full truth of Morganthe's evil cause had hit home at full-speed. She had thought she'd felt broken then, but she had been wrong. That had been only the tip of the iceberg.

* * *

_Rebecca sat down beneath a softly-rustling tree, as though its sweeping branches could shelter her from the doom to come. She closed her eyes fiercely against the gold-kissed moonlight falling all around her, like the shards of solid ice that rained down from the stars._

_Her entire body heaved with tears of deepest regret. They were all going to die. Every single inhabitant of this world would perish, for no other reason than because she had tried to help the Aztecans in other, less important ways, instead of focusing her attention on what really mattered. She had simply assumed that there was time to spare, even though everyone around her knew better. Why hadn't_ _ she _ _known?_

_She had been sent here to protect Azteca from the threatening comet, Xibalba, but in the end, it seemed as though her lack of urgency had, in effect, provided more aid to the Shadow Queen than to anyone else. Her mission had been to find a way to destroy or deflect the comet, but now, such a thing was impossible._

_This crucial responsibility had been placed on her slender shoulders by Headmaster Ambrose himself… but it had somehow fallen, and everything else around her seemed to be following suit._

_Her shoulders were not good enough, it seemed. Not steady enough. Not sturdy enough. Not strong enough. Not anymore._

_And her mission… she had let it fall. She had let them all fall._

" _I can't go back…" Rebecca heard her own hoarse voice, but it felt as though someone else had spoken those words, not her. "I can't go back where it's safe, and just let them die here…"_

_It occurred to her to evacuate them, and bring them to a new home just through the Spiral door. They could follow her to Wizard City, and be safe there._

No, _she thought,_ they would never leave their homes, knowing they could never go back. Their traditions and history mean too much to them.

_She sighed mournfully. That was that, then. She would stay with them until the bitter end. The comet would take her, too, she decided._

" _No, Becky. You won't die tonight."_

_A deep voice that she was sure she had never heard before spoke through the darkness as it settled over the land. Rebecca gasped at the sound and looked all around her, squinting through her tears into the faint twilight, but she saw no one who looked as if they had spoken to her. That, however, was only the tip of the iceberg of her confusion, for no one had called her Becky in many years. In fact, no one ever called her that, save for her maternal grandparents, the closest family she'd ever known. They couldn't be here… She hadn't seen or heard from them since she'd first found herself in Wizard City at the age of ten._

_Just as she began to wonder if she'd hallucinated, the ghostly form of a man flickered into view, hovering before her like a sculpted mist. A magnificent, cream-colored aura surrounded the spirit, illuminating his surroundings. Despite his out-of-place appearance, however, there was something about this shade that made Rebecca feel connected to him somehow. She couldn't tell why, but those kind eyes, that strong face… Surely she'd seen them before… perhaps in a dream, one she'd had long ago…_

" _Becky, you need to leave this place," the spirit told her gently._

" _But… who are you? And how do you know my—"_

" _Me? I'm a man who went off to war, never knowing I had a daughter to come home to… until it was too late. And you, you are a brave young woman who has saved so many lives so far. You need to get away from here quickly, before the worst happens. Go, now; Xibalba will be here in moments!"_

_Rebecca shook her head. "I can't go home…" she protested, tearful once again. "What right do I have to be safe now? I failed them, all of them. Morganthe's prophecy came true, and there's nothing I can do to change that. I was too slow."_

_While she spoke, the ghost sank gracefully into a crouching position so that they were at equal height, eye-to-eye. "Becky, you need to understand what's happened here. This is Morganthe's doing, not yours. You did everything humanly possible to help this world. None of this is your fault._

" _What's more, you have someone waiting for you on the other side of that door. If you were to die here, he would never know what happened to you, or whether you would ever return. All this time, he's lived for the moment when you will. He needs you back desperately… and sweetheart, you need him, too."_

_The reminder that there was someone out there to whom she could run, someone she knew would never think badly of her, someone who cared more about her than the solid ground he stood on, gave her back a measure of hope. The spirit of her father, whom she had never seen before, had little need to convince her further to seek safety. A moment later, she stood, albeit a bit shakily, and made her way to the Spiral door. Clumsy fingers fumbled through her key pouch, searching for the key embossed with the image of Bartleby, the key to Wizard City. When she found it, a hot wind picked up behind her, and as the door began to open, a horrible rumbling noise spread throughout the Zocolo. Rebecca had barely made it through that door before a powerful blast knocked her over, and she fell forward onto the moist earth of the World Chamber while the door itself slammed shut._

_Now dizzy from tears and exhaustion, she lay there helplessly until she felt a pair of gentle arms wrap around her. A familiar voice spoke her name again and again, and Rebecca let herself sink into sleep in those arms._

_Tristan's arms._

* * *

Tristan…

He was _dead_ …

Dead, just like Rebecca's mother and father, except that Tristan's blood was on _her_ hands… and no comforting words of Zinia's could ever wash it away.

She was guilty… and that was a weight she could not bear.

* * *

Traveling under a dark gray cloak to hide her conspicuous brick-red hue from the guards on duty, Zinia took every secret shortcut she knew of on her way outside to the barracks, where many in the Shadow Queen's military would be settling in to sleep. It had been a long day for two lower-ranking guards in particular, she knew, but this was a visit that couldn't wait until morning.

After sneaking swiftly through the gates and past the watch, she hurried stealthily to the small, cabin-like structure that was her destination. One secret knock later, she was allowed inside.

"Thank the stars you're here," Zinia greeted them in Mantean, throwing off her cloak and leaning back wearily against the now-closed door. She had come here many times in her life, but the trip had never been a safe one for her. Still, even now, after the Shadow Queen had recently demoted her to work as a mere servant for her act of defiance the day before, she was still a messenger – and an invaluable spy – for the Fifth Column.

"Zinia," answered the larger of the two young soldiers who had welcomed her inside, also speaking in the mantises' secret tongue, "what news do you bring?"

"The spellbinder…" Zinia began urgently, desperate to explain to them what had been troubling her, "she claims to be the hero we've been hoping for: in her words, an assassin here to take down the Shadow Queen. But from what I've seen, I can't be certain she—"

The younger soldier, whose eyes had gone wide with concern, interrupted her quietly. "Zinia, what did you see?"

Glancing at one of the high windows that hung along the far wall, she sighed. "She just seems so… inept. She's nothing like the warrior I'd expected. She's supposedly faced the Shadow Queen before, after all, and yet I'm having my doubts that she even knows what she's doing now that she's here. You'd think she'd have planned out her strategy better than she has." Zinia shook her head in confusion while her doubts spilled out from her heart.

"More than that, though, it literally _hurts_ me to see her weeping about her duel with Tristan. She says she loved him. But then, why she would leave him in the dark about her supposed plans is beyond me. Didn't she know to expect conflict and tragedy the moment she set foot in the palace? It's a wonder the Shadow Queen hasn't had her locked up and tortured, the way she acts!"

As she fumed aloud to her confidants, Zinia refused to meet their gaze. Despite her words of patient comfort toward the human girl, she had secretly hoped they'd all be free within days of her arrival. But now, no such thing appeared plausible, and she had since been stripped of her pride, doomed to scrub the floors of the palace and be humiliated for the rest of her natural life. All for interfering a day ago.

Vez sighed and shook his head gravely. "So now, the Shadow Queen thinks she's won," he said, and Zinia despaired at the hopelessness that had overtaken his voice as well. Finally, Zinia looked back up at him, and was surprised to find that there was more empathy in his gaze than the misery she thought she'd heard. It was almost as if he were apologizing for what he couldn't have known to prevent.

"She _has_ won, Vez… This new spellbinder was our greatest hope. Now what do we have to look forward to?"

Meanwhile, Krazz had become lost in thought, trying to work out where to go from the deep emotional quicksand in which they all stood. "Our _greatest_ hope, yes…" he muttered pensively, perhaps to himself. "But perhaps not our _only_ hope."

* * *

Several hours after Zinia had returned to the palace interior, Krazz lay awake, staring at the ceiling. He couldn't sort out his thoughts amid the darkness that poured in through every window, suffocating whatever minute traces of candlelight still burned in the barracks. He trusted Zinia and, of course, her judgment. However, the news she had brought that night was as close to unthinkable as any he had ever heard. Every hopeful rebel and spy in Khrysalis had pondered what their prophesized hero would be like, when she would appear, and how she would rescue this world from the Queen's hateful Shadow.

Yet now, all of their stories, their dreams, their hopes, seemed to wither in light of the truth: the hero they'd been sent was neither prepared nor eager for the history-making battle she had come to face. Nor, it appeared, was she able to win.

_Weak-minded coward!_ Krazz thought, gritting his teeth while betrayal and outrage gnawed at him like gravel scratching glass.

Then, though, he sighed. _Angry words won't free Khrysalis any sooner than that human will,_ he told himself without breaking the delicate silence that hovered around him. Even so, he couldn't let the thought go. As hard as the disappointment had hit him, he knew his older brother had been quite nearly crushed by the news, and Zinia's own frustration with it had been clear as well. What could he do now to ensure that Vez and Zinia still had something to hope for?

Just then, another thought struck him, making it a certainty that he wouldn't sleep at all that night…

* * *

The following day, Krazz went on as inconspicuous a detour from his normal patrol as he could, trying to piece together the puzzling concept of his discovery from the night before. To begin with, what he had worked out so far appeared more confusing than helpful. Already, he knew that to truly set himself apart from his brother and Zinia – and indeed, from all of their brothers and sisters in the Fifth Column – he would most likely have to do something to undermine the Khrysaline cause… or at least, to _appear_ to do so.

Just then, as if on miraculous cue, a crisp yet distant crackle of thunder broke the silence that had dominated that lonely corridor only seconds earlier. Krazz shuddered instinctively, knowing what the sudden sound meant, but then stopped walking abruptly. His heart began to pound, and his pace resumed and escalated to a sprint.

He had to reach the throne room, and quickly… At last, the first stretch of road that would lead to victory had revealed itself.

He knew what to do, and it was now or never…

* * *

When he arrived at the doors of the throne room, he found Morganthe shouting threats and words of condescension at Rebecca as the girl took her seat, head hung low. "You'll learn not to be late to your lessons again, little brat, I promise you!" the Queen shrieked.

Krazz knocked firmly on the door frame, because even though the doors had been left wide open, one couldn't be too careful when entering Morganthe's presence uninvited. Bowing in well-feigned respect, he began urgently, "Pardon me, Your Ma—"

Morganthe turned at once to look at the speaker, her expression tense but otherwise unreadable. "What do you mean by this intrusion, mantis?" she demanded.

The sheer arrogance of her greeting was yet another lesson in the way she viewed her Mantean subjects, even those in her own military forces, but Krazz was determined to climb her hierarchy one way or another. He bowed low again before answering, "Forgive me, Your Majesty, but the Lords of Night have begun another verse of—"

" _Silence!_ " Morganthe hissed suddenly, her eyes widening with anticipation. Indeed, the room and its occupants went so silent in the next moment that Krazz started to wonder if Morganthe was literally holding her breath as she strained to hear the ancient song.

"Yes…" she mouthed, her crimson-lined eyes widening eagerly.

Meanwhile, hope started to well up in Krazz's heart, but just in time, he kept a smile of his own from forming, for he knew, even in that moment, that this move was only the beginning. His plan was sure to require many more, and surely more difficult pieces before his kind, and his world, were free.

He bowed a third time and backed away, leaving the Shadow Queen to her "studies."

* * *

When Krazz finally entered the barracks late that night, Vez stood ready by the door, and he closed it behind them, eyeing his younger sibling impatiently. When Krazz only stared wearily back at him, giving no explanation nor even a hint of regret, Vez prompted him in Mantean: "You missed tonight's meeting."

"I'm sorry," Krazz answered with a weary sigh. "I'm afraid I was needed elsewhere."

"Where's 'elsewhere?' Couldn't it have waited until afterwards?" Vez asked incredulously. "Don't you understand how important these meetings are?"

"Well, if you _insist_ on knowing the details, I needed to report to Her Majesty. And no, it couldn't have waited. It was an urgent matter, very time-sensitive…" Krazz added almost dismissively.

At that, Vez's gaze grew wary. Krazz understood; he had never referred to Morganthe with such respect when it was just the two of them talking. "So, what is this 'urgent matter' that absolutely _had_ to come first?" he persisted.

As though bored by the conversation, Krazz explained simply, "She needed to know that the Lords of Night were starting to sing again."

" _What?_ " Vez gasped. "Why would you want to tell her that? If she misses a verse of the Song, all the better for us!"

Krazz shook his head. "Brother…" he began quietly, but then he remembered that he was trying to push Vez away, and addressing him as _brother_ was not likely to help him do that. Gathering what nerve he could, he said in English the one thing he knew would make Vez furious with him: "Whether we like it or not, she is our Queen. Perhaps it would benefit both of us to show some loyalty."

Krazz's assumption had been right. Vez's expression transformed quickly from confusion to horror to fury, and it was all Krazz could do to stand his ground. He was doing this for a reason, he reminded himself, one he must not abandon at any cost.

"Loyalty…?" Vez scoffed. His next words came out so quietly, swimming on a gasped breath, that Krazz could barely make them out: "Never in a hundred lifetimes would I have expected… _you_ … to go Morgantine."

Krazz felt his heart pound in his chest at the accusation, for he knew that if he was ever going to make things better for the lot of them, he must prove it true. "I'm only sugges—"

"Suggesting _what_?" Vez asked angrily, cutting him off. "That we surrender what little hope we have left and submit to the darkest of Shadows? Because it sounds like that's _exactly_ what you were trying to say."

"Vez, listen to me!"

"No! I won't hear of this. You want to talk about loyalty? Where's yours?"

"Mine? My loyalty to whom, Vez? To a handful of misfit rebels?" Then, suddenly, Krazz's breath caught in his throat, and he found himself unable to say another word. It had struck him like a spear through his steely façade that his insults were directed at himself, more than they were at his brother. He was already regretting his decision, and that was a mistake he could not afford to allow, at this point or at any other.

Vez's scorching gaze grew hotter still, and for a long, deafening moment, no words were spoken between them. Finally, he stepped forward and gave his youngest sibling a direct order: "Get out of here."

Immediately, Krazz turned and began to walk away. He tried to feel relief that this part of the plan was complete, and so quickly... but from deep within him, something cried out in despair. He knew it would be for the best, but in his heart, he felt like the traitor he had pretended to be. As he turned to the palace, he wondered whether this feeling of remorse was the curse that now plagued the spellbinder...

Even without looking back, he could feel Vez's eyes burning into him until he was out of sight.

* * *

Early the next morning, Vez found Zinia getting the dining hall ready for breakfast, and he approached her as casually as he could. He announced his presence to her in silence, picking up a stack of dishes from a nearby tray while she had her hands full with silverware. As soon as he placed one in its spot on the table, Zinia heard the soft _clink_ of ceramics on wood and turned.

Relieved to see a kind face, she held his gaze, an amused smirk in her eyes. "A soldier, setting the royal breakfast table?" she quipped. "I can't imagine what that would do to your reputation." She took the plates from him, chuckling quietly.

Vez knew that laugh. She used it often, to hide from her allies that she was hurting inside. "Zinia," he coaxed her in Mantean, "I need to speak with you."

Zinia gave him a look, but responded in Mantean nonetheless. "Here…?" she asked him, surprised.

"They can't hear us talking, Zinia. Please," he implored her, placing one hand gently on her shoulder. "this can't wait."

At that, Zinia seemed to sense the urgency of the matter. "All right… what do you have to say?"

"I have to warn you… Something's happened to Krazz." In response to Zinia's worried expression, he added uncertainly, "I don't know. I can't figure out why, but he… he's changed. Last night, he was talking about how it would 'benefit' us to be more loyal to the Shadow Queen. A part of me still can't believe it was him talking, but I saw it all with my own eyes…"

It was out of compassion for Zinia that Vez stopped talking when he did. She was looking down at the table, her slender form quivering with what looked to him like rage. "What did you do?" she asked in an unsteady hush, still avoiding his gaze.

The question startled Vez slightly, but he answered it with little delay. "I tried to talk some sense into him, but he wouldn't listen. So I… I told him to leave." he finished grimly.

Naturally, he had assumed that Zinia's anger was directed at Krazz. He had been wrong, however, for the frigid aura that now revealed itself in her gaze was a sign he could never miss. "What?" she breathed.

Vez was startled, to say the least. He had expected the news of Krazz's change of heart to come as a blow to Zinia – or to anyone of the Fifth Column, for that matter – but her reaction, however subtle, suggested that there was something else involved here. Could it be he had already spoken with her, convincing her to submit to the Umbra Legion? Might this be only the beginning of an epidemic?

_No! That's paranoia!_ he assured himself, blinking away the suspicion. _I know what this is about. She's just coming to an ally's defense, or so she thinks. But Krazzik is no ally to either of us now…_

"I know this is a shock," Vez said, trying to comfort her. "It was for me, too; believe me."

"What shocks me is how quickly you'd give up on your own brother! Need I remind you that you're the only kin he has anymore?"

Vez narrowed his eyes defensively. "He's the one who gave up on me… on us! If you'd heard him going on about 'loyalty to our Queen…' He dared to speak treason against the Fifth Column! In so doing—"

"Did he, really? What did he say, then? Tell me _exactly_ what he said!"

"Just what I told you: he said she's our Queen, like it or not, and we'd better 'show some loyalty.'"

"That doesn't sound like him at all, Vez. Didn't it occur to you that it might not have been your brother talking?"

The question startled Vez, but he responded at once, albeit with less certainty than before. "What do you mean? Of course it was him." He shook his head slowly, trying to piece together what she was saying through the emotional strain that had overtaken him the night before.

Zinia sighed tersely. "It could have been an imposter…" she replied without hesitation.

"No, I'd know my brother anywhere. Besides, who in the Umbra Legion would willingly impersonate a mantis? You know what they think of us."

"Well, suppose he was under some enchantment, and didn't know what he was saying…" Zinia suggested.

Vez shook his head _no_ once. "I doubt that with equal certainty. He was the same Krazzik in every other way."

Before Zinia could argue further, a large, midnight-blue spider hissed loudly in the direction of the door. "Enough chattering, mantisssses. Get back to work, both of you!"

Zinia hoped the arachnid would leave, but he simply stood there, glaring at them. "You heard him, soldier," Zinia sighed dejectedly in English. She could see what was coming – it had happened countless times before – and she didn't want him here to witness it. She wished _she_ could leave, too, but she still had a hundred or so dishes to set out. Her task still needed doing.

Without another word, Vez made his way swiftly out of the room. As he reached the corridor, however, Zinia watched out of the corner of her eyes as he stopped and glanced sideways at something she couldn't see from where she stood. Further prodding from the spider forced her to tear her attention away from the mysterious occurrence, for she was in no mood to be humiliated yet again by the Morgantine elite. Hadn't Sakathe's silken trap in Zinia's bedroom been bad enough? _No, of course not,_ Zinia thought to herself. _I got out of that mess far too easily for them. They'll be wanting more torturous fun today, I suppose._

Just as she turned back to the table, she heard Vez mutter something angrily in Mantean. Curiosity burned within her as she understood the word "traitor." Had Krazz been listening from outside the room? He must have.

It pained her to hear her confidants so deeply divided, but there seemed to be nothing she could do. Vez, she knew, was as stubborn as anyone else with whom she was acquainted, and he was utterly convinced of this "act of treason." But perhaps, if she could manage to talk to Krazz…

"Quickly, mantissss! I don't want to hear that your hesitance has delayed breakfast…"

"Take it easy, Aranthis. I won't take _that_ long. Besides, I work a lot faster when I'm not being watched."

"And fasssster sssstill when you remember to _ssssilence your tongue_!"

Zinia scoffed, glancing over her shoulder at the ugly creature. "Oh, is _that_ why I've been made to do all this without any help whatsoever?" she asked, wearing her frustration openly. She set a plate down on the table so loudly that she was almost relieved that it didn't break.

Aranthis snapped his pincers at her, hissing threateningly, but for once, she dared to stand her ground. Defiance surged through her veins like boiling water, and in that moment, she could not have cared less if Aranthis were to bite her. But then, a voice sounded in the back of her mind, reminding her that she mustn't allow herself to be killed, at least on the off chance that Rebecca the Shadowhunter would one day return to her senses and defeat Morganthe, as the age-old prophecy had foretold.

* * *

Late that afternoon, Zinia was sneaking a few reagents from the palace's unkempt "garden" when she spotted Krazz at his usual post, guarding the palace gates. She narrowed her eyes curiously, noticing that, strangely, Vez appeared to be absent from the guard post.

She hid the reagents in a pouch of her own making and, leaving the so-called garden without a sound, approached him casually.

"I need someone to escort me to the dungeons," Zinia told him coolly. "I don't suppose _you'd_ be willing to take me there?"

"I take orders from Her Majesty, not her servants," Krazz stated, barely glancing at her.

"Oh, do you need a better _reason_ to escort me there, soldier?" she asked, her tone cunning even as her eyes betrayed a hint of amusement. "I'm sure I could come up with something suitable."

Krazz shook his head in disbelief. "What?"

Zinia didn't reply; she merely held his gaze, her sarcastic smirk in full view, until finally, his straight face faltered, allowing a small smile through. Quickly, though, he replaced it with a feigned aggravated expression. "Why are you wasting my time, _Zarozinia_?" he growled, determined to convince her that he had changed after all. "I have more important things to deal with. Go bother someone else!"

Zinia twitched uncomfortably for an instant at the sound of her name. Her trust in Krazz was unwavering, but at the same time, hearing him call her by her full name made her wonder why he would go to such lengths to do whatever he was doing.

She decided to abandon her arsenal of jokes in favor of a more serious route. "I know you heard us talking this morning, Krazz."

Krazz rolled his eyes in apparent exasperation. "Oh, yes? You saw _me_ there, right through the wall? That's amusing," Krazz scoffed incredulously.

"I saw him looking down at you as he was leaving. Don't pretend you didn't hear what was said… or that you don't care." Without warning, Zinia took his forearm in a firm grip and pulled him quickly inside. Although at first, he struggled to break free, her pace was strong and swift, and for her sake, he quickly stopped trying to pull away from her. Silently, he followed her downstairs, not knowing why they would be headed for the dungeons.

Before they started down the last flight of stairs, however, Zinia led him into the corridor, turning a few corners before she found their destination, which turned out to be a boiler room. Krazz hurried inside after Zinia and locked the door behind him using a simple spell he'd learned years ago.

When he turned around to ask why they were down here, he noticed Zinia's expression and body language had changed drastically. Now, with no one nearby to hide the truth from, she watched him sorrowfully, her heart full of empty questions.

"Zarozinia…" Krazz muttered, barely audible over the loud noise of the magical machinery in the dimly-lit room. He had no desire to admit that she was right; even if they both knew she was. Deep within him, he cursed his foolish belief that Zinia would be as easily convinced as Vez had been. It had been yet another mistake on his part. "You shouldn't have done that, you know. I have orders, just like you do, and I can't—"

"I don't believe a word of it," Zinia interrupted, shaking her head. Krazz opened his mouth to argue, but she stopped him, intending to make it absolutely clear that she knew he was lying, and that no words of his were going to make her resent him. "I know you. I know you better than Vez does, if he could ever think this to be real. I know you'd _never_ turn on us."

Krazz sighed heavily. He had gotten the message clearly enough, but he couldn't explain all of this to her, not yet. "Zinia, I can't—" he stammered, anxiety weighing on his voice. "You don't understand… No! You _can't_ understand. Just let it be."

"Listen to me, Krazz! You and I, we will die allies. Whatever you're trying to do, we're in it together."

Emotions raced like wildfire through Krazz's mind, ranging from frustration to gratitude, panic to courage. It hadn't crossed his mind to let her in on the plan as it was forming in his head, but he knew she could keep a secret with invaluable credibility. She had done similar work in the past for the Fifth Column, but to do this, he knew, she would need to lie to the Fifth Column, as well as to everyone else. The question was not whether she _could_ , but rather, whether she _should_. The other Khrysaline rebels depended on her, her reliability and her credibility. After all that had happened, he couldn't take that away from them. One of their best spies would have to appear to turn on them all, and… he just couldn't bear responsibility for something like that.

"If you really want to help me, then turn away, Zinia. Turn away from me, and act as though I really have changed. Give comfort to my brother. Don't let him think this is his fault. That will help me. Spiral willing, you'll see the full truth in the end."

Zinia's eyes went wide, and she did not hesitate to protest. "You want me to… to _vilify_ you? I'm not go—"

Krazz interrupted her in the same gentle voice he had used before. "I _need_ you to. There's no other way for you to help than by pretending."

Zinia seemed deep in frantic thought, her eyes downcast but clear. Still, Krazz persisted, lifting a hand to the top of her head to stroke her antennae tenderly, smiling when she leaned into his touch. He knew he would never sacrifice this moment to the passage of time; his heart would keep it, and her, safe. "But while you pretend, Zinia, promise me that no matter how long this takes, you'll never forget that I'm still one of you."

When Zinia looked back up at Krazz, he could see tears in her eyes. Lifting her hand to her heart, she answered, "You're _part_ of me, Krazz. You always will be."

"Then promise me, Zinia."

"I promise," she vowed solemnly. "Your secret is mine to keep. Just… please be careful."

Krazz pulled her closer, touching his forehead to hers in a tender gesture of appreciation. There they stayed for many long moments, treasuring the feeling of closeness, the sensation of the other's breathing in time with their own. They savored it as though they might never see each other again, for as each instant passed, it became clearer and clearer that that might just be what the future held for them.

Without a hint of warning, the boiler started to rumble on. Neither of them had noticed that it had turned off, nor how long their voices had been left vulnerable. As if rudely awoken by the sound, Krazz pulled back, still holding Zinia's hands in his, and quickly scanned the area for signs of eavesdroppers. As soon as he was confident enough that they were not being spied on, he cast a sorrowful glance in Zinia's direction before darting away to return to his post.

He knew better than to mention the exchange to anyone, and he trusted Zinia to know it, too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those who don't yet know what Mantean (pronounced MAAN-tee-an) is, when mantises do that :tssk: thing in the game dialogue, I'm calling that a whole different language – one that only mantises can speak or understand. And yes, I know other bugs and Arachna-type NPCs do that, too, but in this series, that'll be considered a mere imitation of real Mantean. No one but a mantis can hear anything but the chirping and clicking we wizards hear when this secret language is spoken in-game.
> 
> \- Khrysaline is my made-up word for the rebels in Khrysalis who oppose Morganthe. I pronounce it KRISS-uh-LEEN.
> 
> \- As of February 7, 2016, Chapter 6 is entirely blank, but I have detailed notes on its overall plot, as well as a few half-written scenes that are planned for that very chapter. I desperately hope that this next chapter won't take half as long to write as this one did, but I can't make any promises at this point. My mind is very disorganized at least 80% of the time, and the other 20% isn't much better. In fact, I'm lucky I finished this before another year had passed.
> 
> \- February 9, 2016 will be Morganthe's Apprentice's second anniversary. Here's hoping I get at least three more chapters up before its third… Heh… And by the way, I've planned ten chapters for this story. That's not set in stone – and I may end up reducing that to seven or eight – but currently, that's my plan in a nutshell.
> 
> \- I hope many of you will continue to read this story and the stories to follow, despite my abysmal update record so far. I adore thoughtful reviews, including those with concrit, and all reviewers – new and old – have my heart! Till next time, my friends, stay awesome!


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